Falling Slowly
by Jade Sabre
Summary: She is young and she is beautiful and she shouldn't think that he doesn't know what she's up to, being young and beautiful and smiling every time she sees him. A knight in love with a city, and a Harborwoman looking for a home; Nevalle/KC.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: **Falling Slowly

**Chapter: **One

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I finished writing this story over a year ago, but due to real life getting in the way of the editing process, it's only now that I'm finally posting it. This fic is different from "Not Yet by Lightning," but I hope if you like one you'll like the other. There are fourteen chapters.

I owe some thanks to Donna, for writing a Nevalle fic that made me sit down and go "wait, that's not my Nevalle at all!" Which made me wonder who my Nevalle was, after all, and next thing I knew… :-)

The title and the chapter epigraphs come from the wonderful soundtrack to the film _Once_, which you can listen to at the Fox Searchlight website for the film. The epigraph for the story proper is the song "Harbor," by Vienne Teng, which is also gorgeous.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein.

---

**Dedication:** To my dear Quark, best friend and beta extraordinaire, who complained that I never write anything happy.

---

"Harbor"

_We're here where the daylight begins  
The fog on the streetlight slowly thins  
Water on water's the way  
The safety of shoreline fading away_

Sail your sea  
Meet your storm  
All I want is to be your harbor  


_Fear is the brightest of signs  
The shape of the boundary you leave behind  
So sing all your questions to sleep  
The answers are out there in the drowning deep  
_

_Sail your sea  
Meet your storm  
All I want is to be your harbor  
The light in me  
Will guide you home  
All I want is to be your harbor  
_

_You've got a journey to make  
There's your horizon to chase  
So go far beyond where we stand  
No matter the distance  
I'm holding your hand_

_Sail your sea  
Meet your storm  
All I want is to be your harbor  
The light in me  
Will guide you home  
All I want is to be your harbor  
_

--

**1**

_I'm scratching at the surface now_

She is young and she is beautiful and she shouldn't think that he doesn't know what she's up to, being young and beautiful and smiling every time she sees him. He knows what she wants—has known it ever since the first time she saw him, interrupting her party, her face turning to his with laughter still in her eyes even as she flicked those eyes over him, assessing and appraising him like any of the other men she saw as he escorted her to her captain. He knows the only reason she persists is because his lord insists on using him to communicate with her, and she's come to see him as a challenge, as someone to be bent and broken and used and then relinquished, not caring whether or not he's able to put himself together again. The thought doesn't bother him—his loyalty is to his city and his lord, not to a lady, and any dalliance he might fall into would never unseat that unswerving devotion. It is more that she sees him _only _as a challenge, a thing to be appraised with an appreciative eye, an adventure, a tactical situation to be assessed, a statue to be toppled. He thinks for the first time that he understands why his female comrades detest being leered at and refuse any companionship, lest anyone think they can take advantage of their willingness. Of course, those women are hardly defenseless, and he winces to think of the man who would try to cross them, but the principle of the thing remains.

And he is not simply an object; he is a man, with his own considerations and agendas and motivations, and the fact that she doesn't want to consider that is frustrating. It shouldn't be; he knows she doesn't want romance, and he knows that he doesn't, either, and so the fact that she only wants him for what he represents shouldn't matter. But it does, and he finds himself treating her with more than the usual levels of restraint—already tight for the man considered to be one of the faces of Neverwinter—which of course only darkens her laughing eyes with carefully tempered lust, as if his apparent lack of any desire made him _more _desirable. Or so she wants him to think, and so he refuses to believe. She finds him desirable because he is everything she does not want to become, and because serving as a bodyguard requires a certain level of physical fitness that is rare in general circles. He doesn't see her often enough to know if she looks at the men in her employ—her "companions," she calls them, and he catches himself wondering how full the sense of that word is, if the accent she puts on it is simply for his benefit, and sometimes he wonders if he is jealous—with the same consideration, but he thinks she probably does.

The first time she sees his lord, she subjects the man to her consideration not once but several times throughout the course of the interview, and he thinks he will either strangle her or himself, for Nasher is not immune to a girl's charms in the way he ought to be, especially at his age. After the brief interview, his lord comments to him that she _is _a pretty thing, and that he ought to be especially nice to her as the trial approached. He made a suitable snort in response and finds himself wondering why she makes eyes at his lord—wonders if it is for the sake of saving her neck, or if she can't help it. He wonders if she considers every man before he can consider her in order to assert herself, to make the men realize that she knows their game and can play it just as well. He wonders if he pities her, and then he remembers that he only knows her lustful gaze and she only knows his uniform, and his uniform requires him to focus his thoughts elsewhere.

She sits next to him, under his watchful eye, as her champion steps forward to face her challenger and defend her innocence, to the death, if necessary. It is not only a wise decision to send another in her place, it is a necessary one: he estimates, with a practiced soldier's eye, that she would last approximately one minute in the arena. Thirty seconds for her challenger to bring her within range of his falchion; twenty-nine more for such a slow thinker to decide whether to hack or decapitate her; and one, and only one, for him to execute his decision. Instead, she sits next to him, and he watches her, trying to balance contemplating her beauty and ignoring her entirely.

She doesn't take her eyes off the battlefield, as the paladin—who she may or may not be bedding; he remembers why the man left the city, and wouldn't be surprised if he had been susceptible to her charms; he wonders if that is the reason he agreed to come back—brandishes a greatsword, rather than the customary hammer and tower shield, at his enemy. He cannot decide if this is a tactical error or not; on the one hand, the greatsword's reach rivals the falchion's, and would allow him more movement; on the other, he will never be fast enough to evade a crazed berserker, and would probably stand a better chance hiding behind his shield until the rage dwindled and the challenger's strength deserted him. The two weapons meet with a _clang_ that rings out, silencing the pre-battle chatter as everyone watches, wondering who will force the other to disengage first. The few Luskans in the crowd cheer, none-too-quietly, as the challenger shoves the greatsword aside and charges the retreating paladin. On his other side, he hears his lord mutter a curse under his breath, and refrains from pointing out that it is early in the battle, and the tide may yet turn. He is not watching the battle, except for the glimpses he catches out of the corner of his eye.

She is, however, and that is why he is almost surprised when she says, quietly, so that he can hear her under the restless, sometimes-cheering crowd, "Sir Nevalle, you're staring at me."

The tone of her voice is colored with a world of implications, few of which are true at the moment and none of which deserve a response. He continues watching her, hearing the crowd moan and his lord curse and half-hoping, half-praying to Tyr that the paladin has a damn good supply of healing potions in his pack.

After a moment she says, "You don't have to watch me so close. I'm not going to do anything." For emphasis, she holds up her hands, tied together at the wrist with rough rope that probably rubs raw the delicate skin it obscures, in his direction, so that she doesn't block her view of the battle.

He considers saying, "We both know you could burn through those ropes in less time than it would take the Luskan to kill you," while he hears another _clang _of steel-on-poisoned-steel and catches a glimpse of the Luskan stumbling. He almost says it, but the implication—that they share anything other than calculated stares and cool indifference—warns him away, and he says instead, "You will pardon me for following orders."

"If you had thought about it, you would have thought twice about putting me so close to Nasher," she says, her tone shifting, still implying more than she says, but with a dangerous undercurrent. He puts his hand to his sword as an unspoken warning, but she either doesn't see or doesn't care. Unspoken, too, is the fact that they both know she doesn't want to hurt his lord anymore than he wants to hurt her, for she is valuable in the eyes of Neverwinter, and he would never offer harm to his fair city. Even as he wonders whether it is his fair city he actually considers in this scenario, she sucks in a breath and says, in an entirely different voice, "_Damn _it Casavir, you have _got_ to be faster!"

"He should have carried a shield, then?" The words escape him before he realizes it; she spoke as a warrior does, one worried about a comrade, and this is a tone with which he is entirely too familiar.

"I don't know," she says, distractedly, a furrow deepening between her delicate eyebrows and a grimace pulling her well-formed lips taut. "Shields and swords are not my area of expertise." And then, as if remembering herself, she says, "I am skilled with…other sorts of weaponry…" but her voice is unapologetically sultry, as if she knows she has slipped and doesn't care, rather than attempting to cover her mistake. As if she will speak to him however she wishes, and he will simply have to listen. Her moods are capricious and he is a steady man, though she probably only thinks that is part of the uniform, and that once he is out of the uniform and in her control she may subject him to her whims and he will willingly follow.

He ignores her words, and concentrates on her bindings. They are smoking slightly, and he says, with a wry undertone he cannot quite mask, "My lady, you will want to exert more control."

She shrugs her narrow shoulders—she sits hunched, on the edge of her seat, and he thinks this is unusual, but he has rarely seen her sitting, normally encountering her moving between decisive actions—and says, "I have to release the tension somehow. There are other, more exciting ways to do it, though I doubt you know what they are." She has the audacity to quirk her plump lips in a half-smile, but before he can begin to ignore her, there comes an inhuman roar from the battlefield, and she gasps instead. "By the gods, he's going to kill him…_run_, you idiot!" she yells, clenching her fists.

"He is a soldier," he says, not daring to look at the battlefield, though at this point it hardly matters anymore. "He is unused to running away as a mode of combat."

"Unlike sorceresses, you mean?" She snorts, but her face is pale. "It's a perfectly valid—_damn_ it—"

In the next moment, her hands are in his lap, the rope that binds them together resting on his knee. "Nevalle," she says, and the calm in her voice is as absolute as her gaze on the battlefield, "please hold my hands."

He complies without a second thought—her hands are small and soft, as he knew they would be; it is one of the few things about her that he has never wondered. It is awkward, due to the rope, to take them in any meaningful way, which is perhaps for the best, but he slips his hands between hers and takes her fingers in his, as best as he is able, and within moments she has managed to curl her fingers around his and clench them, painfully, as she watches the battle and he watches her face. The muscles in her jaw are tense, her cheeks sucked in as she bites on them rather than grind her teeth; her skin draws tight over her fine bones, translucently revealing her veins, revealing how every inch of her is soft and weak. He wonders if she is as helpless as she seems, but there is no denying her delicacy, or the fact that she is not equipped for this particular kind of battle, that she must sit back and watch as one of her own takes her battle upon his shoulders. And her fingers—long, slim, more suited to following lines in spellbooks or tracing runes in powdered unicorn horn—wrap themselves tightly around his hands without a hint of any dishonesty. The battle continues in his ears, and the crowd's reactions with it; her fingers tense, and his do so, compulsively, in return.

He sees, for a brief moment, the berserker charging, and even in that glance thinks perhaps the endgame has arrived—and then it is over, in the overwhelming roar of the crowd, in the way her eyes close and her face falls as she blows out a sigh of relief, in her fingers, tightening once more and then falling not-quite-limp in his grasp.

His lord is standing, announcing the victory, and the final verdict the paladin has won for his lady. He knows it is time for him to perform his duty, and so he rises, pulling her to her feet with him. His gaze drops to her hands as he releases them, though she holds them out expectantly as he—not-quite-fumbles—for the knife in his belt. He slices through the rope in one quick motion, and as they fall away she draws her hands apart, and the crowd cheers wildly again, and he is left staring at the space between them "Casavir," she is saying, and he swallows and looks up, prepared to point her in the proper direction before attending to his lord—and is surprised by her eyes, which belie the relief in her face and her proud, graceful stance with their uncertainty. It is gone as soon as she focuses on his face, except the way she bites her lip—and he knows she is biting her lip to draw his attention to it, and distract him from his duty and her hesitation.

And so he smiles at her, broadly, letting his joy in the moment—the paladin has won, and Neverwinter is safe, and the lady is a hero—flood his face, and then he says, "Congratulations, my lady. You will of course wish to see to your companion—"

"Of course," she says, layering the words with meanings he doesn't hear.

"—so please, do not allow me to delay you any longer." He bows, and knows she will curtsy in answer; so he is ready, when she stands, to catch both of her hands. Her fingers curl over his again, and he bends and presses his lips to the back of each one, feeling their softness, parting his lips just enough to brand them with his breath. He does it with the aim of catching her off guard, but even as he straightens and looks at her again, he wonders if she hasn't just caught him, instead.

"Thank you, Sir Nevalle," she says, and in his name he hears a key turning in a lock, and then she goes in a whisper of silken robes.


	2. Chapter 2

**Title: **Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Two

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** This is the shortest of the chapters. I should add that I did fill in the gaps in our knowledge of the Neverwinter Nine for the sake of this fic.

Thanks for the reviews and favorites; this story is very different from what I've written before, and I really appreciate getting feedback on it.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein.

* * *

**2**

_part of me has died_

_and won't return_

He is not on duty—officially—when the news of Melia's death arrives, but he and Darmon, who _is_ on duty and should be attending a meeting, rather than dropping by to mention that everyone's favorite Squire has been chasing a crazy old man all over the city, meet the page preceding the Squire together, and within seconds they go their separate ways: Darmon to inform his lord, and he to find Melia, and survey the damage done.

He passes the Squire in the hall, looking strangely immaculate compared to her blood-and-sweat-stained companions, and in the brief moment their eyes meet he sees only a hint of lust amidst the concern, and then he is out the front gates, passing the Academy, running down the hill and not slowing once the ground levels. The guards at the gate of Blacklake are expecting him, and he encounters no resistance until he must climb the stairs to reach the second floor of the Moonstone Mask. Ophala is there, trying to explain what little she knows, and then his hand is on the doorknob and the smell of sulfur is in his nose. It is a smell of demons and death, and already he knows what he will see as he steps in the room.

There lies Melia—pretty Melia, who once said she might love a man if he were a blind rogue, blind to her beauty and rogue to slip soundlessly past her defenses—her body at the odd angle at which it hit the floor, the blood in her wounds (long, ugly gashes, like claw marks) congealing, her skin already the ashen color of death. He is thankful no one else comes near as he inspects the body, one bare hand brushing loose hair off her forehead, bare because in his haste he has forgotten his armor. Someone has already closed her eyes—or perhaps she closed them herself, though he doubts it; she would be one to go out watching everyone around her. He passes his fingers down her eyelids, murmuring a prayer and then, having seen enough, straightens and nods to Ophala, standing in the doorway. He stands and watches as she and a few of her girls come for the body, and he helps them lift her onto a stretcher, watching the way her limbs flop limply with a detachment that pains his heart, even as he know it protects him from a deeper pain.

He is not in love with her; he has never loved her, other than the way one loves a comrade, or a sister, or a friend. But she is one of his own, within that small circle of people that constitutes his immediate vision of his city, that circle which he has personally sworn to protect, not just in an oath before the crowds, but in his heart of hearts. His first teacher at the Academy had warned him about becoming a soldier, and told him to keep the circle small, and that if he planned on only knowing soldiers, to avoid having a circle at all. He was not capable of such utter non-emotion, and so he compromised with himself, creating the smallest circle he could imagine. Darmon, one night that they had both been new and drunk, had jokingly called it the Nevalle Nine: Nasher, and his eight comrades. He isn't so sure about that limitation—his mother, who keeps his estate outside the city, certainly means as much as his lord, if not more, and of course his younger sister lately married to a Waterdeep noble counts as well—but he secretly enjoyed the sound of the appellation, and every time he loses one of his Nine, something in him is profoundly shaken.

There is little enough left to do now; everything from the lingering stench to the soot covering the room points to demonic or devilish sources, and he can do no more good without knowing his lord's plan of action. He takes the stairs one at a time, joining the gang of soldiers in the common room, and directs two of them to stay and watch the Mask, one to act as a messenger, and the rest to help him escort Melia back to the Castle, where she will rest until a funeral is arranged. He is one of those carrying the stretcher on his shoulder through the dark city streets, trusting his feet to fall, one in front of the other, as his mind turns to memories of Melia, and her smile and her laugh and her refusal to plan for the future, and her indignation at being sent on a yet another mission due to her pretty face—an indignation that masked her undying loyalty for the city she had adopted. Her family had lived on Luskan lands and emigrated to Neverwinter during the war, in which she lost two brothers to conscription, and she too had learned to fight, much to her mother's despair. He will have to deliver the news, he knows, he or Darmon, who is often better at appearing grieved than he is. Darmon, for all his boisterous cynicism, deeply feels the trials of those who live in the city, whose lives are shaped or wrecked by fighting, and he is best at delivering news of death to families and comforting them in their bereavement. As for himself, he knows that he cannot find a way to let his grief be public, or even private, sometimes, and he prefers to tell the news and depart before the tears begin to fall. For he does not cry, and hates being called heartless.

He sees her once more, leaving the Castle, but this time she is deep in conversation with the dwarf at her side and it is his gaze that lingers with concern on her retreating back. And then they are through the gate, and his lord and Darmon and Alander and Cadia are standing in the entrance hall, and he steels himself to make his report.


	3. Chapter 3

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter: **Three

**Author: **Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I have a note here that says, "You know once upon a time this fic was only supposed to be three chapters long." But it is not! It is a bit longer than that. Hope you enjoy!

Reviews, as always, would be a lovely way to let me know how you feel about the story, and a helpful way for me to grow as a writer.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein.

* * *

**3**

_let go of my hand_

_you said what you have to_

The transfer of funds between Castle Never and Crossroad Keep is generally a low-key affair; the money is either sent in small batches by road, or occasionally paid directly to those merchants who hold the wares necessary for paving the Keep's roads or fortifying its internal structure. The small wagons that make the three-day journey are given a minimal but highly efficient guard, in order to avoid being conspicuous. His elven contact offers weekly reports on the course of the upgrades, and generally his lord is content to listen and spout approval to anyone who voices discontent.

When a request for funds aimed at rebuilding the Keep's walls arrives, however, his lord decides to show his approval in a grander gesture, and answers the request half in gold, and half in the finest stone Neverwinter can offer from her quarries in the north. The caravan is unavoidably large, and deplorably ostentatious, and so his lord sends him as head of its heavily armored guard. There are Cloaktower mages under his command as well, and the journey takes twice as long as it normally would. He has only made the journey once, and his memory of the ruined keep mingles with other ruins he saw, still smoking, during the war, and he is eager to see the physical evidence of the upgrades of which Sand has assured him. He believes in rebuilding; he spent months organizing crews to clear out the rubble of Beggar's Nest after the war, standing knee-deep in broken buildings and wondering how to construct them and better the lives of the people who had lived so long on the brink of nothing.

He has wondered, too, about the Keep's Captain, but while the Keep is important to his lord it is not the only investment in Neverwinter's consideration, and he has had other duties to fulfill. By all accounts she was displeased with the assignment, and by all accounts she adjusted to that displeasure, and he has had few thoughts to spare her aside from his complete lack of surprise at these developments. He dreams about her, more often than he would care to admit, and oftener than that, though he doesn't remember. They are dreams born from her lustful eyes and the feel of her hands against his lips, her fingers against his, and he has dreamed such dreams about his fellow soldiers before and knows that they mean nothing, other than signifying that he has suppressed his own desires in favor of his duty which, given the chance, he would do again, and again, because he is only a man but his duty is to his city, a city with a history and a future legacy of greatness to forge, and he is content to be a part of that.

No bandits dare to attack during the entirety of the journey, a vague disappointment; he is so rarely assigned outside the city that he hopes for some excitement every moment, but there is only the motion of his horse beneath him and the sound of the creaking wagon wheels and hoofbeats and the occasional chattering guard. They reach the Keep at midday of the fourth day, and while the outer gates still look ruined, there is more life than before; men scurry to and fro, weighed down with wooden beams and construction tools, and the two Greycloaks standing guard have the proper posture of well-trained soldiers. He can see that they are hoping their intimidating, professional stance will fool bandits into not attacking, but he can also see that they have some familiarity, if not skill, with their weapons. They are escorted into the front courtyard; he dismounts and his horse is led away for care, leaving him to survey the grounds as he waits for a proper greeting.

The courtyard has been cleared of debris, and here and there stones outline the positions of future buildings; the inn is intact, and the stable attached to it looks so as well. The Keep itself sits atop a sharp incline in the ground; as he looks up the path to its half-tumbled inner wall, he sees a sight he hasn't realized he's missed, until this moment. She stands at the top of the path, distracted by a bald man he recognizes as the one in charge of the buildings, wearing black, and he doesn't know if he can actually make out the annoyed expression on her face, or if he is simply recalling it from times past. He follows her with his eyes as she steps down the path, straightening her robes and flicking her dark hair off her shoulders; and just as he expects (and he wonders if he doesn't hope as well), she takes in all of his soldiers in a single glance. She pauses, near the base of the hill, as her eyes finally land on him and give him their customary once-over; he seems to tingle under her gaze as she slowly runs her eyes from his boots to his hair, and wonders if she hasn't picked up some new charming magics in the time they've been apart. The look in her eyes holds the same appraisal, the same dismissal of anything other than what she wants to see; yet he wonders if the smile tugging at her lips is genuine.

The bald man abandons her to inspect the stone, exclamations of overwhelming joy leaping from his mouth, and so she is alone as she steps to him, dropping into a curtsy which he returns with a half-bow. She wears black, embroidered with white, and gives no clue as to how she has handled the strain of command; she looks _refreshed_, and he finds himself imbibing that refreshment, and relaxing a little himself.

"Welcome, Sir Nevalle, to my humble abode," she says, gesturing around the empty courtyard. "I trust you like what you see?"

"Yes," he says, knowing that he's looking at her as he says it, and not caring. He is willing to play her game, if he must, because she isn't expecting it, and he is in the mood to deny her expectations.

She takes it in stride, of course, and says, "Will you and your men be spending the night?"

"No," he says, and he ignores her fleeting pout. "I am afraid we must return to Neverwinter as soon as the horses have been fed. The stoneworkers will remain; they are yours."

"Then I shan't be lonely," she says, and he wonders why she feels the need to be so audacious. She steps past him to inspect one of the loads of stone; he half-turns to follow her with his eyes. "I must thank you for the baubles, as well. You've brought me some very pretty playthings."

"It is only my lord's sincerest hope to aid you in your task," he says as she steps back to him, tilting her head back to look at him.

"I could use another second-in-command."

"Alas, for duty calls me elsewhere."

"But not until your horses are fed," she reminds him, and in the next moment she has slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow and says, "Shall I give you a tour?"

"I would be much obliged," he answers, and together they ascend the path to her Keep. Her fingers stroke a light caress, finding the gap in his armor at the elbow and brushing the linen he wears underneath, and he can feel it despite the padding and it _tickles_, and he is not a ticklish man. He marvels at her skill, inwardly amused, while she docilely explains that she has given complete control over the Greycloaks to her lieutenant because she knows nothing about soldiers…well, not _nothing_, but nothing that her lieutenant considers _useful_. He can imagine the poor first recruits, and continues suppressing his smile; it is easy enough, because his attention is caught up in the details of the Keep's interior. She shows him the new library, and the war council room, and tells him of her builder's plans for the courtyard, as they walk down half-lit hallways on uncarpeted stones and step carefully around half-unloaded boxes of supplies. The Keep does not yet look like an inhabited fortress in a war zone, but rather resembles a refugee camp, he thinks, his mind again flashing back to the refugees he guarded during the war in places very much like this one, old rundown abandoned buildings whose ruined fortifications were better than no protection at all. Everything is stark and bare, and her finery thus juxtaposed seems exquisite; everything is harsh and flat, which outlines her delicateness and her softness; and his memories are full of blood and death, and her vivacity blows them away with her very breath.

"The living quarters are down this wing," she says, taking him down the hall, and he already knows what she will do and wonders why she bothers when they both know what his response will be. "They're in varying states of repair. Elanee didn't want a room, and Grobnar's happier in the basement, but Sand absolutely refused to start working seriously without some place to sleep away from Khelgar's snores—"

"Unsurprising," he mutters.  
"—and the walls of the Phoenix Tail were apparently too thin for his ears, and so I thought I might as well give everyone a decent place to sleep, should they need one." She stops in front of one closed door, and he follows suit, looking down at her as she looks up at him, her eyes already taking on their seductive hue. She steps in between him and the door, in front of him, her hand still in his arm. "My room is entirely furnished," she says. "Would you care to see it?"

He doesn't answer immediately, though he has an immediate answer on hand; instead he stares down at her, wondering what she will do if he refuses to speak. Her lips pout, ever-so-slightly, and her big, tilted eyes leave little doubt as to her thoughts; and her fingers continue their caress. He wonders if she will try to press him, if he lets the silence stretch any longer; she seems content to wait, but that could change at any moment, if the look in her eyes actually extends as far into her mind as she wants him to think it does.

So he says, "No, thank you," which doesn't stop her fingers, or the look in her eyes, and her smile is bolder than he likes, which is perhaps why he continues. "I believe you, though I must confess I am surprised."

"Oh?" she asks, tilting her head.

He shouldn't continue, and he realizes that; but he also wonders what she will do, if he continues, and so recklessly he pursues his train of thought. "You said the rooms were furnished if people needed them. I can't imagine you need yours very often; or is your bed softer than your soldiers'?"

He has a dry wit and a sarcastic sense of humor that belies his straightforward, honest character, and he enjoys making light jokes at the expense of others, though rarely is the cost as expensive as it is now. Her eyes widen and she sucks in a breath; in the next moment she has withdrawn her hand from him and leans back against the door, staring up at him. He makes no move to apologize, and keeps his own wince from his face, and waits.

Her voice, when it finally comes, has traces of amusement and little else. "You are known for your honesty."

"I do try," he says, unmoved, shaken.

"You think I do this for every man? You think every soldier that comes my way gets this kind of treatment?" She shakes her head, her gaze chastising him for being a bad boy, even though if he had simply been a bad boy she simply would have laughed, instead. "You underestimate yourself. You're a highly valuable commodity."

"I think you overestimate my worth," he says.

She shakes her head again, and she looks at him as she did after he loosed her bonds, and she quietly murmurs, "No, I don't think I do."

He wonders if that is why she would like to have him over and done with, as it were. "Shall I apologize, then?"

"Oh no," she says, and there is a brittleness in her innuendo and he feels the urge to apologize, suddenly uncomfortable and with no escape in sight; he can hardly hope to get away from himself. "No, don't spoil the moment."

"I insist," he says, and without knowing why, he holds out his hands.

After a moment, the first real moment of hesitation he's ever seen in her, she places her hands in his, and they both look at them; he wonders if she does so to avoid looking in his face, and he does so to contemplate the sight of her pale slim fingers against his broad palms, at the perfect shape of her fingernails, at the way the contact is curiously muted, for her hands are _so_ soft and light, and his are rough and calloused. He closes his thumbs around her fingers, and once more he lifts them one by one to his mouth, closing his eyes to savor the feeling. He draws them away, and looks at them once more, and then at her; she is staring at him and he wonders if in her eyes he doesn't see the same sort of confusion he feels in the _naturalness_ of the act.

After a moment she says, "Sir Nevalle, you're staring at me."

He nods, unable to articulate any sort of explanation, and his mind inexplicably has already moved past the moment, towards the duties that lie ahead of him, towards Neverwinter or Luskan or anywhere but here, under the scrutiny of her light green gaze, utterly devoid of anything but life.

"My horse should be ready," he says, and her eyes drop away, and relief floods through him. "Your management of the Keep is admirable. My report shall reflect this."

She shrugs her shoulders and turns her head, examining the doorpost as if its simple pattern is the most interesting pattern she's ever seen; he wants to wonder if it's a rune, but suddenly cannot summon the energy. "You know the way out. Safe travels to you and your men."

He doesn't like leaving her there, alone, but she gives no sign that she cares to look at him anymore, and so he bows shortly and leaves. During the two-and-a-half-day journey home they are attacked by bandits six times, and not a single battle salves the emptiness inside him, and once back at the Castle he requests to be assigned to court espionage, and Nasher grants his request. He throws himself into his work, because he doesn't want romance and she doesn't want romance and every time he wonders if he doesn't want romance _if _she doesn't want romance he remembers the dark look in her eyes and the feeling that he is mere chattel beneath her gaze. Neither alone are enough to keep him from saddling his horse and riding to see her, but together they form a split-rail fence, and he plugs the gaps with Darmon's gossip and Brelaina's reports and the tiny holes with a pint of ale and a glass of wine every night before bed, and slowly duty worms its way back into the cracks and he begins to feel that he might be whole, again.


	4. Chapter 4

**Title: **Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Four

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I struggled with the very end of this chapter, but other than that, here's another update, skipping along in the OC.

I appreciate the favorites I've gotten! Reviews are lovely; I would love to know what you think.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein.

* * *

**4**

_and the rule of thumb don't apply anymore_

'_cause the house is burning_

His lord summons him, one day, weeks and maybe months later—the days all string together, when there is little intra-city turmoil, when the Docks are docile and the nobles meek, cowed by the earlier murders and the killer still on the loose. He answers the summons immediately, of course, rising from his desk and straightening his cloak as he follows the pageboy down the hallways, into one of the side chambers his lord uses when he wishes to make more private announcements. His lord awaits him with a smile on his face and a scroll in his hand that looks like a royal summons, and tells him that, even without his constant oversight, the Keep has flourished, and by all accounts the young Captain has done an exemplary job of managing the men and women under her control. He knows his lord too well, and sees the tightness in the other man's eyes, and waits for the bad news; his lord knows he requested not to be assigned to the Keep any longer, and usually respects such requests, except in the direst of circumstances. The needs of Neverwinter exceed the needs of any one of her members, and he knows this; and so he waits to discover what he must do.

His lord hands him another report, the latest from Fort Locke, already two weeks old; he tells him that they fear the worst, and that all of their resources must now be turned towards the coming onslaught from the King of Shadows's army. In times of such literal darkness, the need for a shining hero grows evermore; and how lucky they are to have found such a hero in one who can summon light with a mere thought. His lord wishes the Captain to come to Neverwinter immediately, for the sooner she comes the sooner she may return, a Knight, with all the resources the title can command, and the sooner they can offer their far-off hero to the people, to ease their war-worried minds.

It is the first time he is not entirely sure of his feelings on a subject relating to the good of Neverwinter. He cannot deny the need for a hero, nor can he deny the Captain's suitability for the role, and yet he remembers what happened to the last proclaimed Hero of Neverwinter, after the war and Aribeth's hanging and Aarin's profession of love. Nasher persuaded the latter to take their hero south during the former, and when she returned to find her repented friend dead, she quarreled with both her lover and her lord, and she left. It was for the best, of course; her refusal to understand Aribeth's death meant that she could not clearly see its benefit for Neverwinter, and she could not fully align herself with goals she could not perceive. She was too powerful to stay, and Aarin was too necessary to be allowed to leave. He had disappeared soon afterwards, however, though whether on some secret mission from which he hadn't yet returned, or on his own agenda, he didn't know; he had barely been high enough in the ranks to know of the spymaster's existence during the whole affair, but he had heard the story enough times in the years since. He had memories of the hero, of course, brief flashes of a woman warrior, fierce in battle to the point of sheer abandonment, passionate and dangerous, tall and strong and deadly, utterly unaffected by anything other than her own desires.

He wonders why he is uneasy, as he saddles up his horse and rides for the Keep, because he cannot remember a time he has ever hesitated to deliver an order, even if the hesitation is only internal and never to be acted upon. He wonders if he knows the answer to his own question, and wonders why he shies away from it; and he rides alone down a road that is wide and paved and patrolled, a far cry from the rocky path he first took, or even the rough road he took weeks or months ago, on his last journey. He concentrates on the road, and on the patrols he sees, on all the details that he will have to report later—well-paved roads mean an easy path for the enemy to take, should it come to that, while well-maintained patrols mean perhaps the enemy won't make it to the road. He files away the details with his practiced soldier's eye, because a soldier takes orders and delivers orders and follows orders to the letter, or he dies. And he is nothing if he is not a soldier.

He arrives late on the second night—he has pushed his horse towards exhaustion, and asks for two new horses to be saddled even as he heads up the path to the Keep's front doors. As he identifies himself to the guard (hardly necessary, but the guard insists) and prepares to enter, he hears a telltale whisper of cloth that suggests someone is attempting to pick his pockets. He reaches behind himself and catches the culprit by the scruff of his neck, surprised and yet not surprised to discover that there are street urchins at the Keep—they are a ubiquitous creature—but surprised that one would attempt to rob _him_, of all people. For the moment, it is a humble reminder that outside of his city he is not a well-known, well-beloved knight and protector of the people, but another noble who may or may not know how to use his sword properly. He sets the boy down on his feet, gently, but keeps a firm grip on his shoulder.

"Are you lookin' for the lady?" the boy asks sullenly. "She ain't in the castle right now. They're all in the Tail, yellin' about somethin' or other."

He blinks, then belatedly thanks him, after checking to make sure his purse is still attached to his belt and that most of the money is still contained within. He wonders, as he turns to go back down the hill, who "they" are, and what something-or-other they might be arguing about. It is dark, but there are torches in the doorway of every building; and there are many more buildings now than there used to be, and so he makes his way across the courtyard with ease. He pauses a moment before the door, deciding the best way to make his entrance, and then opens the door and strides in at a measured pace—and stops, dead, a few steps into the inn. They are all staring at him—she seems to have picked up more companions than he remembers counting before, and there are elves and a tiefling and a dwarf and a gnome and several humans and that githzerai who has apparently not murdered them in their sleep—and there she is, staring down another human in front of the fireplace. The man is older, and the tattoos on his skull glow; he remembers descriptions of Melia's murderer, and has a striking suspicion that he has found him.

The warlock has noticed him, but as the man turns to face him she snaps something about avoiding the situation, and then she whirls to see what has captured everyone's attention—and he, frozen to the spot, receives the full brunt of the fury and pain radiating off her, before she recognizes him, and crosses her arms, her expression cooling but still tight with emotion. "Can I help you?" she asks, and he remembers the smile she used the last time she saw him, and he wonders if this is the most honest expression she has ever given him.

He remembers his orders, and his message, and falls back to that. "I am here to summon you to Neverwinter. Lord Nasher requires your presence immediately. I am to escort you to Neverwinter—"

"I'm not going anywhere," she snaps, and he realizes that he has made a mistake in not offering her a choice, and he doesn't know how to repair it.

"My lady," he says, knowing that the language he uses will only infuriate her more, yet not having any other resources at his disposal, for he knows he is far more susceptible to her charms than she is to his, at least in this moment, "I am afraid it is a matter of utmost importance. You alone are to ride with me to Neverwinter, and if we wish to make good time, we must leave now."

"_Now_? Now is—alone?" she asks, and he wonders what she is thinking. The warlock stands between her and the fireplace, so she stands in shadow, and he thinks he would not be able to guess, even if he could clearly read her expression. He waits, not knowing what else to say, until finally she says, "Very well. I will go with you to Neverwinter."

He lets out a breath he didn't realize he was holding, and opens his mouth to say—something—but she turns again on the warlock and puts a finger in his face, looking like a child poking an older sibling, and hisses, "I am _not_ finished with you. As for the rest of you—" She looks around at them, and he can see, suddenly, that she is shaking, "—be careful."

"Of course, my lady," says the paladin, his voice quiet and rumbling, his aura flaring—he has worked with enough paladins to recognize their soothing touches, and he can see some of the tension leave her as she sighs and lifts her chin, sweeping past him and out the door.

He follows her, and she glances at him and says, "Do I have time to fetch a few things?"

"Of course, my lady," he says, and as she turns away and heads to her Keep he realizes, with a start, that there are tear tracks on her face. Something stirs within him, and he leans back against the wall, watching her go, because he cannot think of why she might be crying and he does not know what he has interrupted and he knows from experience that it is better to tread carefully around a fire trap, rather than prodding it directly to see if it will explode or not.

She returns with a cloak and a bag of holding, and after seeing him acknowledge her return she moves without speaking towards the stables, and so he follows, at a safe distance. He wonders if she notices, but she still does not speak, even as they swing into their saddles and set off through the outer gates—the walls gleam in the torchlight, the Neverwinter stone blending with the other stone to form one of the strongest walls he's ever seen—and down the road at a fast pace. She rides low over her horse, her cloak streaming out behind her, and the gallop into which she coaxes her horse is entirely unreasonable if she wants the animal to survive a two-day journey, even if it is only a day-and-a-half at this speed. He watches her, for his new mount is as hardy and trustworthy as his former one, and needs no urging to match its partner. He worries for the horses, though, and for the darkness; the moon is setting, and soon it will be too dark to ride anymore. Although he wishes to return to the city as soon as possible, he has slept very little over the past few days, and he is out of the practice of sleeping very little. This is a good thing, for it means he has not been living on soldier's rations in muddy ditches for weeks on end; but part of him misses that life, with its seeming simplicity: kill whoever attacks you, and worry about the diplomatic complications later. A part of him looks forward to the upcoming battles, but there are more diplomatic complications to come before that, and with a sigh he consigns himself to speech.

"My lady," he calls, hoping she will hear him past the wind that must be whipping in her ears; his voice sounds strangely loud on the otherwise quiet road. He doesn't dare rein in his horse until she has acknowledged him, and it is with great relief that he sees her pale face turn towards him. He pulls up, and she sees him do it and follows suit; the horses keep going at a walk, their sides heaving, and he nudges his a little closer to hers, so he doesn't have to yell as loudly.

In the fading moonlight he cannot see if there are tears on her eyes, but her eyes are red and puffy, and the tightness in her face has not eased, and he sees all this as he says, "We must rest soon. The road grows too dark for us to see."

"Too dark for _you_," she says, and her voice crunches like gears to which oil is applied too little too late. It is worse than her usual seductive tones, and he winces internally. "I can summon a light and we can keep going for hours."

"Yes, but the horses will eventually need rest, my lady," he says, hoping to soothe her with the epithet, though she doesn't seem to notice. "It might as well be now, when we cannot see without aid, as later, when the sun will be shining too brightly for us to sleep."

"Hm," she says, and it sounds a little more like her old self, like the woman who smiled at him when he rode up to the Keep; the words that follow remind him of her, exactly. "I never thought _you_ would be the sort who preferred the darkness, sir knight."

"It's better for sleeping," he says, not knowing what else to say, hoping only to make her _stop_.

She stretches, then, lifting her arms up over her head, causing her cloak to fall back from her shoulders, revealing her robes which fall just so to reveal her form; she arches her back, drawing attention to her breasts, small and round, and for a moment she achieves her desired effect and he cannot stop himself from wondering if he would be able to cover them with his hands, and even as he tries to wrench his attention back to the situation at hand—hand, _his_ hands, mentally wandering over the cool silk of her robe (it will of course be cool, and it will of course be silk)—she says, "There are _so_ many more interesting things to do in the dark."

"Yes," he says, and he's worried because he doesn't quite know what he's saying, because he has forgotten how to maintain his defenses around her and he is too tired to remember and she has no doubt grown only more alluring in the months they've been apart, and this is one battle into which he ran straight without any preparation or armor or strategy, and while part of him finds this exhilarating, it is the part controlling his wandering hands, and he must be able to _restrain_ _himself_. "But—I am tired, and you, my lady—"

"What?" she asks, her knee bumping into his; they have stopped short without him noticing, and she is leaning from her horseback to look up at him, the cloak falling away from her head to reveal her hair, straight and dark, and her heart-shaped face and her eyes and her nose and her lips and her knee is touching his and he has to fight to keep from swallowing, not daring to give her a hint of his inner struggle. "What am I, sir knight?"

He opens his mouth to speak, and gives in and looks down at her, directly, down into her puffy green eyes, red from crying, around her red nose, and he hears the phlegm in her voice, and still unaware of exactly what he is saying, he says, "You, my lady," and he is unaware that his voice is low, and hoarse, and she closes her eyes and tips her head back, as if his voice is like a lullaby, "are distraught."

Her breath leaves her in a quick shudder, and she opens her eyes to stare at him, and he stares back, and then she swallows and looks away, and says, "We should probably rest the horses."

She turns her horse aside before he can speak and he watches her for a moment, afraid she will bolt, but she restricts herself to a steady trot, not once looking back at him. He nudges his horse after hers, but he remains at a safe distance, trailing after her into the solitude of the moonless night.


	5. Chapter 5

**Title: **Falling Slowly

**Author: **Jade Sabre

**Chapter:** Five

**Notes:** Just thought I'd mention again that this fic and the _Once _soundtrack go very well together.

This is a not-so-subtle plea for reviews. I would love to know what y'all think about the story and the style. I hope you enjoy the chapter!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein.

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**5**

_and I'll come running to fight_

_and I'll be at your door_

She doesn't speak again for the rest of the night, as they find a clearing on the side of the road and tie their reins to tree trunks and stretch out on the ground—she has thought to bring a bedroll, but he has nothing more than the cloak on his back—and as she sets up her camp, humming off-key, he consigns himself to keeping watch for the entire night. It comes as a surprise, then, when he opens his eyes to the early morning sunshine filtering through the leaves of the trees, feeling as rested as if he has slept the entire night. He looks sharply at her, but she merely hands him the reins of his horse, half a loaf of bread, and a waterskin, and then she leads her horse back to the road and mounts up without comment. Still suspicious, he follows, but the pace they set for the day is much more reasonable, and he suspects they will reach Neverwinter by early evening of the next day. They pass merchants and farmers traveling down the road, and fields of grain with watchful hamlets in the distance; to the far east he can see the mountain peaks, while west the land stretches flat to the unseen sea. It is beautiful country, country which he has sworn to protect, and he glances at its mistress—soon by ownership, not mere command—and wonders what has shaken her. They do not stop but slow for lunch, and she offers no conversation, and he does not press her.

At dusk they reach the point where the Keep's road meets the High Road, and turn to follow it; it is much more crowded than her road was, and he wonders if news of Fort Locke's fall has already reached the greater populace. The moon is waning, and even as true darkness begins to fall they continue on their way, past camp circles on the side of the road where fleeing merchants and refugee families have stopped for the night, wary of shadows but too weary to continue. Finally he can barely make out his horse's ears in front of him, and as she gives no sign of stopping, he slows and asks for a light.

She follows suit, and makes a gesture, saying words he recognizes only from long hours in the company of wizards; and nothing happens. There is a pause, and then she tries again, and then she mutters a profanity and says, for his benefit, "I…can't."

He feels the stirrings of panic—surely the King of Shadows has no magic that can prevent a seasoned mage from casting the simplest of cantrips—but then she says, "I haven't rested since…before the Haven, I—"

"Then we stop," he says firmly, his suspicions about his earlier magical sleep now confirmed. "Do you have anything which—"

"I have a ring of cyan," she says, digging her bag of holding—he is amazed she can think to find something as small as a ring in its planeless depths—and withdrawing it, slipping it on her finger (and he remembers her fingers). His eyes are flooded with pale blue light; he blinks away the blindness, and finally has a clear look at her face; she looks even more drawn today than yesterday, as though the effort of keeping herself calm requires her to tense every muscle. She is in no shape to travel without resting, and her eyes are still red, whether from crying or exhaustion, he does not know. "We can keep riding—"

"No," he said. He looks around the area and reviews his position, and finally says, "There is an inn a mile away. Will you be able—"

"I can still _ride_," she snaps, turning her face away from him as if he let his concern show in his expression.

When they arrive at the inn, he discovers that they have enough hours until dawn for her to have a full night's rest; he considers asking for some sort of soporific, knowing she will not hesitate to resist his suggestions of rest, but thinks the innkeeper might object. Instead he asks for two rooms, and a bottle of wine, and hay for the horses. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees her raise an eyebrow at the mention of wine, and he sees that she is trembling. Against his better judgment he pours out half the bottle into a tall mug, and hands the rest of it to her, pointing her in the direction of her room and returning to his, shutting the door and releasing a sigh before turning his attention to his surroundings.

The room is small, and narrow, and the bed hardly deserves such a name, but he doesn't really want to sleep yet anyway; his magic sleep from the previous night has left him wide-awake and energized. He unbuckles his bracers and removes his outer tunic, the chain shirt he wore for this journey (light and practical, barely noticeable to the fleet horse he rode), and the linen shirt he wears beneath. He lays his sword atop the neat pile, and the dagger he also keeps on his person; satisfied that everything is in order, he examines the amenities. There is a candle and matches on the bedside table, which is directly beneath the tiny window; he sits on the bed, his mug in his hand, and sips at the wine and tries to concentrate on the issues of strategy that follow from Fort Locke's fall. The Keep will be next, he is sure, but Fort Locke's fall also leaves the entire southern section of the High Road vulnerable, and he knows the King of Shadows could just as easily send half his army to Neverwinter. The erstwhile King's quarrel is not, by Sand's account anyway, with his city, but an attack on Neverwinter's land constitutes an attack on herself and must be treated accordingly. Better to make a preemptive strike against him, he thinks, rather than waiting for him to raze the land on his way to the city. The thought of sitting in his city waiting for the attack leaves him restless, jumpy almost, and he notices that his fingers are drumming the side of his half-empty mug. He dislikes unnecessary movement, knowing how important it is to conserve one's strength, and sets the mug on the table, and the door opens.

He closes his eyes to avoid rolling them, because while they both know exactly why she is here, he cannot fathom why she thinks these particular circumstances are going to inspire any sort of new reaction from him, even as the door shuts, and there is a thump of something hitting the floor. He opens his eyes to tell her that his answer is the same as it has always been, and he suspects she has a great deal more to worry about than the upcoming exchange, and he wonders why she bothers—

She is naked. He realizes this, as she steps around the bed and stands over him, and he blushes, deeply, because in the end he is a gentleman, and for any woman to be so bold without prompting makes him uneasy. He sits up straighter and fixes his eyes on her face, which he can barely see, but at least it is her face and not—not—in one smooth motion she climbs onto the bed and settles herself on his lap, her thighs pressing his between hers, and she lifts her gaze to his and he looks at her face but his peripheral vision cannot help but notice that her hands are on his chest—and for the briefest moment, he lets go.

He does not encourage her, exactly, but she assumes that silence gives consent and runs her hands—her hands, he loves her hands, he thinks, if there is one thing he loves—and it is the only part of her he knows, really, her hands, but he leaves his arms limp at his sides and his hands on the bed and he watches her run her hands over his chest, and then lean forward and press a kiss to the base of his throat, and he loses sight of her as his eyes close reflexively. He has not bedded a woman—has not particularly _wanted_ to bed a woman, has outgrown the childish urges of his adolescence—for many years, and her hands are the softest substance to touch his skin in at least that long, and her lips leave their own sort of mark as they trace his collarbone, and he smells the sweetness of the wine on her breath. The blood is rapidly rushing from his head and the wine is taking its place and her hands are triggering responses he hasn't felt in so long, and when she leans forward to kiss his neck her breasts brush his chest and he instinctively arches his back and she _purrs_, near his ear, and traces a quick line of kisses down his chest. She sits back on his lap and places her hands flat on his hips, her fingers on his skin and her palms on his trousers, and in the space of the moment she takes to tease him with her stillness, he says, "Tanithar, stop."

It is the first time he has said her name, and when her eyes flick from his fairly obvious arousal to his face, and then back, he sees surprise in them, as naked as she is. He sits up as straight as he can, and she slips down his legs, and he says again, "Stop."

"Are you sure you want me to?" she asks, her voice just the same as it was, as it has ever been, and that is all it takes to clear his mind.

"Yes," he says calmly, aware of her hands still on his hips and his somewhat labored breathing. He takes a moment to slow it, taking long, luxurious breaths, and then says, "I don't want this."

"I beg to differ," she says, and her hands start to move; he grabs them and holds them to his chest, pulling her forward at an awkward angle, and says, "I want you to sleep."

"I don't want to sleep," she says, unsteadily, and he sighs and draws his legs in, so that she no longer sits astride them, and keeps them drawn in, as well as he is able. He transfers her hands to one of his long enough to light the candle, which he leaves on the table; it gives enough light for him to see her face, which is childlike in its petulance. He keeps her hands in his, partially to keep her from doing anything else with them, and partially because he likes the feeling of her hands in his, and while he does not want her in this moment it still requires an immense amount of self-discipline—which he has amply, but which is still hard to summon, in this moment—to deny her, and he selfishly wants to save a part of her for himself. So he holds her hands, and after a moment she shifts until she sits next to his legs, and draws up her own knees to hide the rest of her from view.

He sees that her arms are shaking, and notes her words, and finally says, "Why not?"

She stares at him, and he stares back, because he needs to know not only for her wellbeing but also for the wellbeing of his city: he can hardly allow his lord to knight a mentally unbalanced sorceress. The two wellbeings are equal in his mind, in this moment, probably because he holds her hands against him, as if trying to promise her that he will keep her secure, though he knows that if she is too dangerous he will destroy her without hesitation.

She swallows, and her tired eyes darken with a different emotion, and she whispers, "Shandra's dead."

He has a vague memory, he thinks, of a blonde woman, a fighter, but he doesn't really remember her, and he is horrible at consoling others. So he says, "Oh."

She narrows her eyes at him, her perfect eyebrows drawing together as her lovely lips purse, and her tone is downright acidic as she says, "It's not my first comrade death, and I know you probably think I should just get over it because after the first one they all come easy, but it—she was killed by—it _hurts_, okay?" She shakes her head, her dark hair falling over her bare shoulders, and whispers, "I want it to stop hurting."

He considers telling her that it hurts to be treated as a mere object for consolation, as a simple tool that will give her a momentary pleasure to drive away the pain, and he is surprised when that thought is true, because he has known her views from the beginning and thought he has hardened himself to her objectification. There is a difference, he supposes, between a lustful glance given across the boundary of squire and knight, and casual dismissal in bed, and he wonders if she knows that; he wonders again why he cares. He does not tell her this, however, and merely says, "I'm not going to be able to do that."

"You'll do well enough. Well enough to get me through Neverwinter and back—"

"To some other man's bed?" Apparently it hurts more than he realized.

Her eyes widen and her lower lip trembles and he tries not to look at it and tightens his hold on her hands, pressing them to his chest and covering them with his own and stroking their backs with his thumbs. "Since when do you care?" she asks. "I've seen you looking at me—how you're looking at me right now—and I thought you—"

He looks away from her, immediately, and curses himself, because he doesn't care and yet he does, so much that the sight of her, broken and defenseless on his bed, _hurts_ him, makes him want to snatch up his sword from the floor and charge out and challenge whoever dared to hurt her, and he knows what this is just as much as he knows she doesn't want romance and he doesn't want romance _if _she doesn't want romance and yet he cannot stop himself from trying to be romantic. He releases her hands and pushes them away from himself, and says to the candle, "You need sleep, alone, in your own bed. Only time can heal your hurt."

"I know it will heal. I want it to not _hurt_."

"Then why rub salt into an open wound?" He runs a hand over his face and sighs. "Go to bed, my lady." He glances at her; she has wrapped her arms around her legs (everything about her is long and pale, even though she is short, perfectly proportioned) and rests her chin on her knees, staring at him unfathomably.

"I don't want to be alone," she says.

"Then sleep in here, my lady," he says, "and I will watch the door." He cannot leave her, and so he reaches out a hand, and she places hers in it, and he kisses it and then covers it with his other hand. "I promise nothing will harm you, and that it will hurt less, when you wake up."

"You're lying, Nevalle," she says, but she gives him a half-smile, and that is enough to convince him to release her hand and swing off the bed, dressing again and tossing the robe she dropped on the floor back to her on the bed. He leaves the room, shuts the door, and leans against it, dropping his head into his hands and rubbing his forehead, wondering if he has done what is best for his city or for himself, and how far away his lord can spare to send him in these dark times.


	6. Chapter 6

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter: **Six

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I apologize for not updating last week; it was spring break, and apparently Disney charges for internet (I should not have been surprised by this), and I am cheap/already broke due to going to Disney in the first place. So! Here is the next chapter, and I hope it was worth the wait.

Thanks so much for the reviews on the last chapter; I always appreciate whatever you're willing to share.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein. Although, to be fair, I never actually created a Tanithar or played through the game with her, so perhaps I could claim her, though her trappings belong to Wizards of the Coast.

* * *

**6**

_there comes a point in every fight_

_when giving up seems like the only way_

They spend the rest of the journey to Neverwinter in perfect silence, behaving in all cases as two people who happen to be in service to the same city, whose duties draw them together, although he thinks she doesn't believe in duties and acts in order to decrease the tension, when in fact her disapproval only heightens it. But he doesn't say anything; he is too busy observing how well they work together, in the silence, marveling at her ability to communicate without words and her ability to realize what he is trying to tell her before he has to open his mouth. He wonders why it is so easy to speak about horses and food breaks and pacing in this language, and so hard to realize what underlies their actions, their silence, their careful separation. They behave as two people who have never come closer than saying "sir knight" and "my lady" in the most honorable of tones, and he is honest enough to disapprove, but even he cannot force honesty on another, and part of him is relieved by their courtesy.

She is the one to break the silence, as she must be, from her position of something akin to shame, he thinks, as they ride under the gates of Blacklake in the late afternoon, their horses walking through the crowded yet subdued city streets. "Why have I been summoned?" she asks.

He shakes his head. "I cannot tell you, yet, my lady," he says, because he doesn't know what his lord's plans are for the lady; he suspects they involve waiting until the last possible second to inform her of her new station, in order to give her the least amount of time to protest.

"Hmph," she says, and they return to their silence.

They ride into the castle, where attendants await them, having heard of their arrival at the city gates; the women take her away, while Darmon and Alander clap him on the back and take him to his quarters, where a bath is waiting. While he scrubs himself clean, he listens intently to his comrades as they explain the planned schedule of events (he will be the one to announce the honor to the lady, and recite to her the tenets of knighthood; and then she will be presented before Nasher, where the official reading of the oaths will occur, and then Nasher will give a speech to encourage his people, and then she will be knighted; and then there will be a ball in her honor), listens intently enough to wash away any other memories that might stir when he sees his own chest. He does not relish the idea of telling her of her new honor, despite the fact that the position is one he highly respects, and one of which she is worthy; he does not relish the idea of spending any time alone with her, when she is so clearly uncomfortable spending time with him. He steps out of the bath and dresses in the official light armor of the off-duty Nine, his blue tunic boldly emblazoned with the Eye, comforting him with its gaze as it reminds him of all the things so much greater than himself, things which concern him more than one woman in his city.

He waits for her in one of the antechambers off the main hall, one simply furnished compared to the rest of the castle—there are chairs and a wardrobe, and a chest especially for her, containing the accoutrements of knighthood. He studies a painting of the hanging of Aribeth on the opposite wall, standing at attention, and half-turns when the door opens. Cadia flashes him a sympathetic half-smile and then stands aside, holding the door open for the Captain; she glides in, her gaze demurely on the floor, her hands clasped in front of her. They have dressed her in pearl hairpins and earrings and a gown that crackles with magic to his trained eye, one which is the rich blue of Neverwinter, a color which is neither here nor there on her except, he thinks as she looks up at him, to draw attention to the striking green of her eyes. He knows she could be wearing the sackcloth of Ilmater and still be beautiful, and when he looks to Cadia, who smiles before closing the door, he knows that his knowledge shows on his face.

"Why have I been summoned?" she asks again, her voice as polite and aloof as any courtier he has ever met, and for a moment he does not recognize it.

"Fort Locke has fallen," he says simply, "and the King of Shadows marches north, for your Keep and your city—"

"He has already destroyed my city," she says, and he chooses to ignore this.

"—and my Lord Nasher, wishing to signify his confidence in your abilities, and bolster that of his people for the upcoming days, has decided to grant you knighthood."

"Knighthood."

"Yes." He looks at her, and cannot help smiling; he remembers his own calling, and the pride and excitement linger still, reminding him in part why he loves what he does. "It is a great honor, my lady, but one which you have deservedly earned. You have rebuilt a Keep that even the most seasoned soldier would have quailed upon facing, and under your direction the land around it has thrived—I have seen it with my own eyes. This is less the bestowing of an honor, and more the recognition of the honor within you."

His words bring color to her cheeks, but he means every word, and he will not let his own discomfort interfere with his desire to convey the truth. The title is a burden in her eyes, and he wishes to encourage her to the bearing of it, because she is a hero, and heroes must recognize their own value. He opens the chest and withdraws the cloak, its yellow cloth like water between his fingers, and hands it to her, watching her face as she divines the enchantments upon it: her eyebrows raise and she purses her lips as if she will whistle, but she doesn't, instead simply tossing it around her shoulders in one smooth movement and clasping it, smiling slightly. It fits her perfectly, of course, and he swallows and turns back to the chest, withdrawing the sword and handing it to her as well.

"I can't use this," she says, a little bit of her normal tone creeping into her polished voice.

"Lord Nasher will use it to knight you," he says, unable to keep a small smile from his face, "and then you are free to hang it above your mantle and keep it as an heirloom, my lady. The ceremony will be long, and afterwards there will be a feast in your honor, but you will of course be free to return to Crossroad Keep tomorrow, as your duties there are far more important than attending the Neverwinter court."

She smiles back, a little, which warms him more than he will allow himself to admit—this is her moment, and he will not spoil it with questions or displays of emotion unwanted on both sides. She examines the sword and he hands her a scabbard, as well, which she inexpertly buckles around her waist; he considers offering his assistance, but is wary of touching her. He cannot help, however, offering her his arm, and she slips her hand into the crook of his elbow as easily as she ever has, but today her fingers are still, and she stands a little apart from him. He denies any disappointment and slips into the role of a courtier, escorting the lady out into the main hall, from which they will enter the throne room. Other courtiers are already there—he sees Mournee and Alander, and supposes that Cadia and Darmon are both on duty—and upon seeing the Captain, they immediately swarm to her, offering her congratulations and words of admiration and praise, which she accepts with the same grace that has always carried her through. Mournee whispers slyly in his ear that she looks very pretty on his arm—he knows Cadia has spoken to her and sends a mock glare in response, hoping to disguise the real discontent he feels when he sees the way the Captain observes the men who approach her, flicking her darkened eyes over them before smiling in a way that accents the fullness of her lips. It is her old glance, and he feels more like an object than ever before: a mere pedestal for her to stand upon while masses of men notice what he's already noticed, that she is a beautiful, smart, powerful woman. He refuses to look at her any more and instead thinks back to his pride in the moment; he lets himself be proud of the work she has accomplished, and the glory it has brought to his city.

At first he thinks the noise is some sort of strange elven choir his lord has ordered for the event—it would not be the first time Nasher experimented with his choices for entertainment—but as he meets Alander's gaze and sees the other man's grin slipping away he realizes that they are indeed the ancient alarms, and the gates that slam shut over the doors to the throne room only confirm his suspicions. By then he is already in motion, barking orders over the screams of the noble ladies as the Captain disentangles her arm from his, drawing his sword and falling into a triangulated position with Mournee and Alander, reviewing possible secure positions to take the civilians, not knowing where to go without knowing where the enemies are—

And then they are all around, shadows pouring from every dark corner in the hall, the outer doors bursting open as the stench of the undead precedes their actual arrival. The women are still screaming, while the men do their best to form a protective circle; the Captain whirls from place to place in the room, casting protection spells over the civilians and the soldiers—he feels, for the briefest moment, the touch of her hand on his arm, and the wave of strength that follows. It is the last moment of respite before he throws himself into the battle; the shadows dissipate with a wave of his sword, and he swings through countless of them at a time, but the vampires are tough, and old, and wise, and they bring with them ghouls and ghasts, which _smell_; he has forgotten the scent of the undead, and knows that soon the stench will overpower the weaker men and women. As he finally decapitates the elder vampire he faces, Alander runs past, yelling about the guard room, and he takes a moment to locate the correct hall in relation to himself. The moment costs him a scratch on the arm, but he sees that the civilians are already moving in the correct direction, and need a leader to guide them while he and the other two members of the Nine cover the retreat.

She doesn't know the Castle, but he finds her in the midst of a great expanse of light—she systematically aims the light at the undead, burning their flesh, and it hurts to look at her—and points, and she nods and goes, and he and Alander and Mournee are able to draw together into a tight defensive line that follows the retreat down the narrower hallways, giving them the advantage, until finally they are all crammed into one of the side guard chambers. He slams the door shut and utters the words that will seal the ancient protections, and slumps against it, his arm beginning to ache fiercely with what he suspects is probably an infection. He looks and sees Ivarr, already tending to the wounded civilians, and makes his way towards the haphazard line. Alander and Mournee join him; she is wiping undead ichors from her blade with a look of disgust, and says, "This is my best handkerchief."

"What the hell are we going to do now?" Alander asks. He has only been a member of the Nine for a few years, and has seen very few major conflicts.

He looks to Mournee, who pauses in her work to study his face, and asks, "Neverneath?"

He nods, while Alander says, "That's just a myth. You can't possibly—"

"We know where the entrance is," he interrupts impatiently, "but we've never actually been able to open it. It is said to open in times of great need, and if this doesn't count, then I don't want to know what kind of challenges Lord Halueth was expecting." He closes his eyes, visualizing his castle in his mind, plotting out the best route to the tapestry of the founding of Neverwinter that conceals the entrance, trying to ignore the uncomfortable numbness in his arm. He knows he must go, as Mournee's seniority requires her to protect the people, and Alander is yet too young, and he can feel the magic laid on him by his oath as a member of the Nine bristling, as though he is failing in his duty. When he opens his eyes he sees the same itch in his comrade's faces, and turns to call Ivarr's attention.

"What are we doing now?" He is surprised that she is there, and asking, but only for a moment; her hair has come unbound, and her gown and cloak are streaked with bits of undead, and the look on her face is grim. "We can't stay locked in this room forever—they'll break that door down eventually—"

"Eventually," he says, "but not immediately. The magic will protect it for a long while yet. I must go to Neverneath—"

Her eyes narrow, but he cannot tell why, and he wonders why she turns to Mournee and asks her "What's Neverneath?" instead of himself.

"A series of passages beneath the Castle that lead directly into the throne room," Mournee answers, and the women look at each other as if exchanging some sort of agreement in which he and Alander, judging by the look on his face, are not to be included.

She turns back to him and says, "Send me."

He shakes his head immediately. "The entrance will only open for a defender of Neverwinter—"

"I thought that was the whole reason I was being knighted?" she asks, and her tone is wry, like he remembers, and for the briefest moment his worry melts into a willingness to allow her to do whatever she wishes. "Besides, you're wounded. It's turning green. Send me.'

He wonders just how green is green, even while saying, "My lady, you are not equipped—"

"I've got a sword," she says, and he finally looks into her face and realizes that there is no way to stop her from going. "Besides, I'm faster than anyone else. You need someone to get to the throne room, and you need them to do it as quickly as possible, and frankly, I'm the best person for the job." He opens his mouth to protest, for she has yet to swear her oath while his is singing in his blood, and she says, "Sir Nevalle, if you attempt to stop me, I will paralyze you and leave you on that bench until this entire war is over."

Mournee laughs, and Alander reaches out and shakes her hand enthusiastically. He sighs and bows his head in submission, and wonders if it is her loyalty to his city that lights her unstoppable expression, or something else, and he wonders what that something else might be, but he does not allow himself to wonder for long. He looks up at her and pauses, for he does not know what to say, and finally settles on, "Tyr be with you, my lady."

She smiles at him, then, and it is exactly what he needs, although having never seen her truly smile he cannot say he has known this need existed before this moment, and then she turns in a grandiose whirl of gown and cloak; the people instinctively part before her, and she slips soundlessly out of the room, emanating confidence in her every step. He hears someone murmur of the new Hero of Neverwinter, and hears the thread picked up until it is on all of their lips; and he closes his eyes, and waits.


	7. Chapter 7

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Seven

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** And we soldier on through chapter seven, in which Nevalle's mind has a penchant for wandering and wondering, and Tanithar is faced with a choice.

Reviews would be lovely!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein. Although, to be fair, I never actually created a Tanithar or played through the game with her, so perhaps I could claim her, though her trappings belong to Wizards of the Coast. Cadia, Alander, and Mournee also came from my head, rather than the game content.

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**7**

_and the truth has a habit_

_of falling out of your mouth_

The waiting is interminable. Alander and Mournee sit next to him, and all three center their concentration on the call of their oath, waiting for it to recede, for the danger to be past. He shivers from the infection—Ivarr has healed it, but the effects linger, and he finds a small part of himself wishing that he were still fighting a war, that he would still be fit for combat. His last few years in the Castle have softened him, running espionage in Aarin's absence and Darmon's refusal to continue working it, and he wants to be reassigned again. He thinks he will mention it to his lord, which brings his little self back together with the larger picture, waiting to find out if his lord lives or not. He does not know the exact punishment for ignoring one's oath, or letting oneself become distracted from it, but every time his attention wanders he feels guilty. He is a soldier, able to concentrate on one object for days at a time, but he can't stop shivering and the involuntary motion irks him, and he lets himself be irked. It is better than feeling helpless. The undead continue to pound at the door, which has almost every piece of furniture dragged in front of it, and he wonders if he will be able to help hold them off, if they break through the door.

Then suddenly the release comes; he lets out his breath in a long exhale, while Mournee slumps next to him and Alander, ever the younger guard, lets out of a whoop of joy. The pounding on the door ceases, but he refuses to let anyone leave, preferring to wait for a summons instead. The lords and ladies swarm him, demanding escape from their claustrophobic surroundings, but he ignores their finery and concentrates on the door. Mournee stands, sword in hand, ready to clear the furniture at a moment's notice; Alander takes his charm to calm the civilians; and he sits, inactive as he has not been inactive in years, for a new thought has taken hold of him. His lord is safe, yes, but at what cost? He reminds himself that no cost is too great for the safety of his lord, and thus the safety of his city, though the two are not directly related; still, he has sworn loyalty to his lord, and loves him, and his concern should not be wondering if more has been lost in the battle to save his lord than he was yet willing to lose. He shivers and lets that serve as his excuse, and in that excuse feels his own weakness, and shivers again.

There is a loud knock at the door, and an order in a very real, living voice, demanding that the door be opened. Mournee throws the chairs aside and jerks the door open, brushing aside broken bits of china with her feet, and there stands Darmon, undead gore on his uniform and his hair falling from its bindings, looking particularly relieved to see them, though the look is gone into annoyance as soon as he is sure they are all safe. He stands, and smiles into his friend's scowl.

"Good to see you're all alive," Darmon says. "We could've used you in the throne room, but no matter. Lord Nasher wishes to see the Nine, if you feel like leaving."

"Nevalle's been hurt," Mournee says, upon seeing that neither Alander nor the wounded soldier in question plans to speak. He frowns at her, but his hand rubs his arm reflexively; the wound is barely visible, but still faintly green.

"Well then we'll just _walk _to the throne room, shall we?" Darmon says, and offers him a shoulder he knows he will refuse. Despite his occasional misstep they make good time to the throne room—all paths in the Castle lead there eventually, and theirs is particularly close. He looks, and sees his lord standing hale and hearty, if with a sword in his hand, and is thankful; but he sees no sign of a young woman in yellow and blue, and his heart, to his horror, stops.

"Lord Nasher," Darmon says, and he bows with all the others, then grasps his lord's arm when the older man comes to greet him.

"I am pleased that we all survived this attack," his lord says, but there is a fire in his eyes that is usually reserved for when he speaks of Luskan and its treachery. "That the King of Shadows would dare to send his minions in here is troubling, at the very least, but today we have prevailed. It seems I have chosen my new knight wisely."

His lord waves a hand, and he sees what he did not, at first: a head of dark hair poking out from behind a tapestry. She pushes it aside and steps out completely, apparently explaining something to one of the soldiers; he can see, out of the corner of his eye, a dark opening beyond the tapestry, but otherwise his attention rests completely on her, taking in the blood and gore on her robes, wondering if she is badly hurt or if another was hurt around her—and then he realizes what he is thinking, and that he is verging on the edge of panic, and sternly orders his mind to his lord's words—but his mind wanders, as if it cannot be still for joy.

"You called, my lord?" she says, and there is sarcasm in her voice and evaluation in her gaze as she steps to his lord's side.

Nasher cannot stop the hint of a grin on his face at the way she looks at him, as if he is still young and virile, and he cannot stop the pang in his heart or the words that spill out of his mouth. "You have knighted her, my lord? But—but my lord, there are rules and ceremonies and etiquettes to follow—"

His lord laughs, and they join him; Darmon laughs the loudest, and he tries his hardest not to blush. "Nevalle, you were knighted in the mud at Redfallow's Watch, with orcs pressing in all around," as if he needs to be reminded, as if he does not remember every second, replaying it at this moment even as he stares at her and she stares at his lord, "really, these are times of action, not ceremony. We stand upon our deeds, and the Lady Tanithar's deeds, the deeds of the Knight Captain of Crossroad Keep, show beyond any ceremony or words that she is a loyal citizen of Neverwinter, a competent warrior, and a wise leader. We are proud to recognize her as our Knight."

Alander claps her on the back, causing her to stumble; his lord has addressed this speech to the entire room, and the applause is thunderous. He watches her face twitch as his lord speaks, and she glances at him as if she remembers his words, but knows that at this moment her fate rests in the hands of his lord—of _their _lord, and he selfishly applauds this connection—and directs her attention to him. At his lord's signal, the members of his Nine who are present—himself, Darmon, Alander, Mournee, and Cadia—gather around the throne, where he settles himself, his sword still in hand. She comes as well, and they leave a place for her, breaking their half-circle in order that she may stand before her new lord. He wonders what else will happen, if there is some oath she has not had a chance to swear, perhaps, but then his lord says, "Knight of Neverwinter, you have proved yourself to be invaluable to my city. In the short time you have dwelt among us, you have shown the courage, cunning, and pride of my best soldiers."

His world seems to stop. He knows this speech—and he sees in his comrades' faces the same recognition, the same sense of remembrance. He knows Alander remembers three years ago, when Lady Ilyria retired after an encounter with a rogue Luskan left her blind; Mournee and Darmon remember the plague, and the deaths of three of the Nine; Cadia remembers the formation of the Nine itself, and pledging her loyalty on the day their lord ascended his city's throne. He himself remembers a day not long after the end of the war, when the Hero had left and the rebuilding had gone on, when the death of Sir Orilius came after a month-long battle with baalor poison and the summons came from the Castle, calling him away from the rubble to a less physical, but no less real, position: the rebuilding of his city in the abstract, the protection of her through the person of his lord. He remembers his mother's tears, and his comrades' smiles; and he remembers the words of his lord.

She is stunned by the offer; he feels as if he possesses the Sight, as he looks past her cocky smile and confident stance and sees the shock she feels, lurking in her eyes. He sees what she will say and wonders what he wants her to say, wonders why his heart is in his throat; wonders if his face is as easy to read, and if that is why Cadia glances at him, and smiles. She takes a moment to collect herself, flicking her gaze over his lord, over Darmon (who tries to smirk, but smiles too genuinely), over Alander (who blushes despite his professional stance). She does not look at him, and for this he wonders if he is grateful. She opens her mouth, closes it, and finally says, "My lord, I am no soldier."

"Hardly," says his lord, with a wave of his hand. "You are a Knight, a woman of free thoughts and decisive action. And so I offer you this position, the position that Melia once held; as you completed her mission, may you complete my circle."

"My lord," she purrs, and his face heats as he remembers the sound of her purr in his ear, even as he knows she does it to offset the words that follow, "I am greatly honored by your selection, but I'm afraid I'm just not cut out to be your bodyguard. I'm a sorceress. I'm not _built_ for…close combat," she says, as though she is built for something else and he knows how she is built and wonders if Tyr will curse him for remembering this at such a moment. He _sees_ this woman because in this moment he is the only one who has seen her and has at least some inkling as to what motivates her refusal, and yet it is not him on whom she turns her lustful gaze, and he knows he would not want her lustful gaze and yet he wonders at the jealousy—and it _is_ jealousy—bubbling in his heart.

"My dear, you are wonderfully built," his lord says, and for a brief moment, the first and last time, he wishes to strike his lord, "and need not worry about such matters. Close combat you may learn; otherwise you may keep to the back. I do not keep all of my Nine close at all times; I suspect your duties at Crossroad Keep will have you busy for years after this King of Shadows," he growls the name, his anger returning to him, "business has finished."

"Lord Nasher, you compliment me," she says, dipping her head, "but I cannot accept your offer."

"My dear," Cadia says, "think carefully about this decision. Lord Nasher does not offer his protection lightly. I doubt it is all that you fear it would be."

"I think it is exactly what I fear it would be," she says, and he can't help a smile, because if his lord had asked him he would not have recommended her. He should be horrified, or offended, or dismissive of her dismissal; and yet he smiles, because she is alive, and she does not want to do this. "I am sorry, my lord, but I cannot be one of your Nine."

His lord settles back on his throne, stroking his goatee. "That is…unfortunate," he says, and the smoldering anger from the attack is back, but she stands her ground and he cannot help but respect this. "For it means I must send one of my Nine with you, and I only have eight of them, you know, and three are already assigned elsewhere. But if you are sure…"

"I am."

"Very well." He looks around his assembled guards, and they all, instinctively, bow their heads before their lord; he himself concentrates his gaze on his boots, doing his best to suppress the occasional shiver. The healing process accelerates the time it takes the disease to run its course, and he can feel its last vestiges draining away, taking with it some of his strength. "Would any of you like to volunteer to go to Crossroad Keep? Darmon, you're out, I'm afraid, but the rest of you have a choice, now, if you would like."

They raise their heads a little and glance among the ranks—it is an old game among the Nine, for Nasher only offers a choice if the task is particularly unwanted. Cadia and Mournee both fix their covert gazes on him, while Alander keeps glancing between him and Darmon, and Darmon glances between him and Alander. Cadia and Mournee are both smiling again, while Darmon's stern eyes beg him not to let the kid fall under the sorceress's influence. But he cannot volunteer; he is content now for her to go her own way, because even while he smiles to know she is alive he remembers—everything, and he keeps remembering even now, when he ought to be concentrating on anything—and he knows he is the worst possible candidate. So he stares at Cadia, and hopes she in her elvish wisdom will understand. His lord is watching them, he knows, but his lord also remembers that he wants nothing to do with Crossroad Keep or its mistress—mistress is the wrong term to use, his memory keeps ambushing him, and he cannot concentrate on the proceedings—

"Sir Nevalle, I believe," his lord says, and they all raise their heads.

"Oh—" she says, and falters as Cadia and Mournee turn their smiles on her and covers it up with a smile of her own, one that hurts him to see. "Of course." She runs her gaze up him, crawling from his boots to his face and he can almost feel her soft hands on him and knows that this is a terrible idea, and presents her with a polite bow and a neutral expression, before turning to his lord with a pleading one instead.

"Sir Nevalle, you have been keeping surveillance on the Keep for months. You are the best suited for this job, and you know it," Nasher says, and he knows his lord wonders why he is so reluctant to work with the chosen hero. She is a pretty sorceress, but hardly the first one he's ever met; and he wonders that he would be hard-pressed to explain to his lord _why _this particular sorceress distracts him so completely. "Make sure no one attempts to impede my Knight Captain's plans for her Keep, and report to me daily on the Keep's progress. Lady Tanithar, I suggest you seek Sir Nevalle's advice; he has served me as a Knight and a member of the Nine for many years, and his counsel is sound."

"Yes," she says, and he hears a hint of the softness that makes his heart ache and his sword arm itch, "I know. We will ride back this evening, if my lord does not object."

His lord does not object, and so he steps away from the rest of the Nine and bows with her, and they depart the throne room. They do not speak; the ride to the Keep is similar to the last leg of their journey to Neverwinter, and he hesitates to speak to her, when she so clearly wishes nothing more than to be done with Neverwinter forever.


	8. Chapter 8

**Title: **Falling Slowly

**Chapter: **Eight

**Author: **Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I apologize again for the delay in posting; this is my last semester in school, and I hope to use posting these chapters as a way to measure how much time is left, but I am also in denial about how much time is left, and so delaying in posting is my way of avoiding the truth. I'm only posting chapter eight! Surely I have…five weeks left. Alas.

In happier news, this begins a stretch of "my favorite chapters" (which, okay, are pretty much the entire fic, but anyway), which also coincides, at least for the next two, with a bit of fudging with the game's timeline. This chapter and the next one technically do not follow the game's chronology, but I don't think adding a few extra weeks in between one plot point and another to be any great crime. You are, of course, free to disagree.

Reviews would brighten up my dreary, theses-laden days like gold coins in a ray of sunlight.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**  
8**

_raise your hopeful voice_

_you have a choice_

_you've made it now_

She gives him a temporary room in her inn and departs for her Keep, and Sand is the next person who comes to speak with him. The elven wizard becomes his only contact in the weeks that follow, as he tries to persuade him to persuade _her_ to build a tower for the Nine to use. It is a tricky negotiation, for she has already refused a position with the Nine and their competitor is a mage, and he wonders if perhaps he pushes his luck too far in his arguments with Sand. He eventually wins the second floor of the tower—the bottom one is empty, while the upper ones belong to the planewalker, and the price of his new home is the sound of strange explosions and the occasional feeling of displacement when his neighbor's spells exceed their normal boundaries. He wonders if this is her revenge on him, or if perhaps she is teasing him, but as the weeks go by and he does not see her he wonders if perhaps she has simply banished him from her thoughts, and he struggles to do the same. It is not easy; away from his city, constantly surrounded by reminders of the Knight Captain, distractions are noticeably lacking. Although ostensibly he is to supervise the training of the troops, the sergeants are jealous of their roles and perform their duties so well he has little to do but occasionally inspect the ranks. There is no gossip from court, unless it is her court and news that the ranger and the paladin have fought again; there are no lords planning backstabbing betrayals of each other or his lord, no Luskan spies lurking, and he catches himself daydreaming at his desk when he should be rereading the latest dispatch from Neverwinter. His comrades in the Nine, also dispatched to various strongholds to muster troops, send him encouraging, detailed letters in response to his subtle cries for help, but he cannot help but think that Mournee and Cadia still laugh at him. He thinks they would not laugh if they saw him alone in his tower, and then he immediately chastises himself for self-pity. He has work to do, even if the results are not immediate, and so he throws himself into that.

Still, the tower is lonely, and he often listens for the sounds floating down from the upper levels, usually strange words in Startear's mellifluous voice, but occasionally more normal voices attempting to haggle with the planewalker. He never visits his neighbor, though he sees him from time to time. He takes his meals at the Inn, where the Knight Captain's companions generally avoid him, and he sleeps in a small bedchamber off the main study of his tower. He speaks to the sergeants and sometimes to their lieutenant, who treats him warily, aware of his place in the hierarchy and yet also aware that he holds no real power so long as the Knight Captain ignores him. And everyone seems to know that he is not welcome, and that the Knight Captain has refused the request of his lord and that he is probably watching her to ensure her continued loyalty to the City. He sees in the faces of those he meets that the people's loyalty is to their Knight, not his lord, and he knows that the Keep is a dangerous liability to his city so long as it remains at the capricious whim of its Captain. He idly wonders if there is some way to ensure her loyalty without his watchfulness, and resolutely takes comfort in the fact that she cannot hope to survive the upcoming battles without Neverwinter's support. He is lonely, yes, but he has been alone before and he has survived, and more importantly, in his loneliness he helps to strengthen his city. It is one of the smaller sacrifices he has made to his city, and if he is less glad to make it than some of the others, he simply ignores it.

He hears someone coming up the staircase, which means Startear is about to have a customer and should probably stop whatever he is doing to make the ceiling undulate as it has for the past half hour. His window is open over the courtyard and he hears the sounds of the smithy and the armory while he writes another report, summarizing the last week. He awaits Sand's latest report so that he may read it and summarize it as well, and when the footsteps stop on his floor and pace through the antechamber that leads to his study he sets down his quill, steeling himself for another round of Sand's complaints that the missions are too dangerous and the ultimate quest too insane for one simple hedgewizard to handle—

There is a _thunk_ as something heavy and silver lands on his desk, and a plaintive, female voice says, "It's a _sword_."

He blinks and turns in his seat, staring up at her as she hops up and perches on the edge of his desk, her eyes on the sword she has dropped. A few locks of dark hair have escaped their bindings and hang in her face, and the look on her face is overdone despair. She wears green robes, although they look more like a dress to his mostly untrained eye, and her hands rest in her lap. "A _sword_. What am I supposed to do with a sword?"

"Sword, my lady?" he says, his wits slowly returning to him. He hopes he has managed to keep his mouth closed and quickly looks at the sword; a low whistle escapes him before he is able to stop himself, and he picks it up without thinking about it. The blade is jagged, wickedly curved, and made of what looks like molten silver, which shifts and slides in the afternoon sunshine. The handle is relatively simple, a good grip, with a large red gem set in the center of the crossbar. Even in his insensitive hand, he can tell it is magical, and that in the right hands it will handle superbly, though in his it feels a little off-balance, too light for its size.

"A sword, sir knight," she says, and her voice is impatient, and he is so startled by the overwhelming _honesty_ of her tone that he runs the sword through a few motions—awkwardly, because its weight does not swing as it should—before attempting to glance at her again.

"It's a good blade."

She snorts. "It's the Sword of Gith. It had better be good."

He starts and stares at the sword, running through all of Sand's reports, putting the pieces together just as—"You reforged it, then?"

"Yes," she says, and then she sighs and rubs her eyes. "All the shards I had are now in that sword, and I—I don't know how to _use_ the sword. I wish I had just gotten a piece of some dead wizard's staff instead."

He does not know what to say. He sets the sword down on the desk and continues to stare at it, rather than look at her, because after six weeks of silence he cannot fathom why she should come to his study and begin complaining about a problem he has no idea how to handle. He has dealt with magical items before, and seen heroes and spoken with them, but swords out of legends thousands of years old and their bearers were out of his realm of expertise. His lord gives out the orders concerning them, and he follows them; he does not know how to help a hero to whom destiny had given an object she cannot use. He can feel her gaze on him and avoids it; she has begun the conversation, not he, and if she wants to continue it then the burden is on her. She picks up the sword, and he watches her fingers curl around the grip as naturally as they once curled around his hands and he knows instinctively that the sword was balanced and weighted perfectly for her, and that no one else can hope to wield it even half as effectively. He sees, too, that she has some unconscious sense of this, but he also glances at her face and sees that she has no idea where to begin honing this newfound skill. And suddenly, he knows what to say.

"Do you have someone to teach you the basics of swordplay?" he asks, and he glances at her again and she glances back with a smile playing at her lips, as if he has done exactly as she hoped.

"Well," she says, "I suppose Casavir could do it, or Khelgar if it came down to it, but…" and then she looks back at the sword, and she sounds shy, and part of him doesn't know whether or not to trust it and the other part is so happy to hear her voice that it will believe anything she says, "I thought perhaps if you had the time…I have heard the men say that you are an excellent swordsman, and I thought it would be best to learn from the best."

He wonders when the men told her this, but she looks so eager and so innocent that the part of him that will follow her words to the edge of the world and beyond shoves the bitterness away and answers, "It would be an honor to match blades with the Sword of Gith."

Her smile fades a little, but she hops off his desk and picks up her sword, holding it awkwardly as she sweeps a small curtsy. "Then I shall see you tomorrow morning, on the training fields."

She turns and steps towards the door, and for a moment he cannot think, can only watch her move, and then his curiosity overcomes both his lust and his good sense, and he asks, "Why?"

Before he can berate himself, she turns around, and cocks her head at him, as if trying to decide which question he is truly asking—and as he himself is not sure, he cannot blame her for the pause. "Because," she says finally, and the smile lingers around her lips while her eyes are serious and locked with his, "I have had you in my Keep for six weeks, and I couldn't stand the thought of another day passing without my speaking to you." She shrugs, as if it is nothing, while he slowly processes what she has said, and finishes lightly. "It seemed like a waste."

And then she is gone and he is staring at the place where she once stood, his belief in her words at once anchored on them and utterly shaken. His mindless happiness disappears in the blink of an eye, leaving behind something far more sinister: hope.


	9. Chapter 9

**Title: **Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Nine

**Author: **Jade Sabre

**Notes: **Again, adding a couple of extra weeks that don't exist in the game, in exchange for conversation. I hope you won't object.

This chapter contains a tiny shout-out to the novels of Megan Whalen Turner, of which I am a great fan.

Reviews are always greatly appreciated it.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**9**

_walking on moonbeams_

_staring out to sea_

They train every morning for at least an hour, sometimes longer, as she grows more confident and wishes to learn more techniques, faster and faster. Sword-fighting—or at least sword-fighting with this sword, for with all others she is clumsy and useless—comes as naturally to her as magic, but she does not have the muscular development to be truly effective, and many of his lessons are for her endurance and her strength. He stands and watches as she holds her position, sweating even in the early morning sunlight, and he calls out instruction and advice on her position, but he is very careful not to touch her, unless it is with the flat of his blade, chastising her for dropping her point in third during the simplest warm-up. Yet he finds even the basic exercises gratifying: her bond with her sword, and her natural inclination to obey her instinct, make her the perfect opponent. Occasionally she is a little _too_ good, but for the most part she is just challenging enough to loosen his muscles and remind him of what battle is truly like—not a series of basic maneuvers, but a great deal of quick thinking and ingenuity. He does not let her know exactly how skilled she is, but he sometimes sees her laughing as she thrusts and tangles blades with him, as if his surprise shows in his face. The paladin and the dwarf assist as well, but while she accepts their help, there is something deliberate in the way she seeks him out, every morning, something that tells him that when he sees her laughing, it is all right for him to smile back.

She has other duties, of course, and she rarely invites him to observe her as she governs her Keep and rushes from one wild quest to another. He is no adventurer, and he is very aware of this, watching her come and go, barely having time, it seems, to rest in between missions. Yet somehow she makes the time to train with him, and somehow there is enough time for her to improve under his tutelage, and somewhere amidst all the battles and the quests and the commands and the reports and the training, they have time to speak. Often it is merely shouted half-conversation in the middle of battle, or brief exchanges when she complains and he questions and she answers with surprising honesty, but sometimes she seeks him out, and very rarely he does the same. He is her guest, after all, and relies on her schedule to have time to hold him. Very often he wonders if she is escaping some meeting for the good of the Keep, and he wonders at her uncanny ability to figure out when he is about to address the correspondence from Neverwinter; in the overarching picture, these minor delays are not in his city's best interest, but he cannot help but think that his city is only as strong or as happy as her members. For the first time, in a long time, he is selfish, and no one appears to suffer as a result.

He has come to recognize the sound of her footstep on the stairs, the quiet way in which her slippered feet—she never wears boots at the Keep, for she likes to pretend she is off-duty, she tells him—slide across the carpeted stone in the antechamber as she makes her way to his study. By her second visit she has commandeered the extra chair in the room, and by the third she has tailored it to suit her tastes; it matches absolutely nothing else, and his desire to keep everything orderly protests its ornate plush cushions in the face of his austere chair and desk. He mentions this to her, and discovers that after every subsequent visit something else in his room has turned from hard and wooden to soft and plushy, and must concede defeat. After especially tedious missions, she brings a bottle of wine and dinner with her to share with him. Her companions still avoid him, though he suspects this is partly out of personal guilt and not because their Knight requests it, and she never suggests that they come together; instead she sits on his floor while he sits at his desk, and they eat.

One evening he sits on the floor with her, balancing his plate on his outstretched legs while she rests hers on the floor next to her. She sits with her back against her chair, while he sits to her left, his back against the wall, far enough over that he can see her. The room is not large, and his booted feet nearly brush her cross-legged knee, but he has outgrown his need to draw away from her and she gives no sign that she considers his feet to be intruding upon her space. He has finished, and sets his fork down, watching her as she picks at the last few pieces of beef on her plate. Her hair is loose, and falls over her shoulders; she unconsciously brushes it behind her ear, and then catches sight of him, silently watching, and she brushes it again, smoothing it. He smiles a little at this shyness, but says nothing.

"Is it the ear?" she asks finally, touching it. It is not exaggeratedly pointed, like an elf's, or even the sharp point of a half-elf; it looks more like a halfling's ear, and is inhuman, at any rate.

"No," he says, honestly, "but I have wondered…"

She laughs and sets her plate aside again. "Daeghun says my paternal grandmother was an elf. I got all her looks but none of the seeing in the dark, I suppose."

It certainly explains her narrow stature, her fine bones, her eyes, and her ears; he has never given much thought to what half-half-elves must be like, and in contemplating this, he realizes he is also making a categorical list of her appearance, and attempts to focus himself. "Your father was a half-elf?"

She shrugs. "My mother was human, I know that much. After that is anyone's guess, but Daeghun insists, and I suppose he would know better than anyone else. And sometimes I…catch a glimpse of it. I think my grandmother gave me my magic." She snaps her fingers and casts a cantrip of dancing lights, juggling them over her fingertips, and he can't help but smile again. He finds himself smiling around her, more than he has smiled or been able to smile in his many years at court, and wonders if he simply didn't allow himself to smile out of duty, or because there was nothing worth smiling about.

"Daeghun's your foster-father?" he asks, though he already knows, as she has spoken of him before. He too sets his plate on the floor and draws his knees up enough to put his feet flat on the floor. "Is he very elven?"

"What do you mean?" she asks, glancing at him.

He shrugs. "Elves tend to be, in my experience, very…aloof, unless they're defending their correctness or their homeland. And they seem to think all the other races are very…young, no matter how old they are."

"Oh. Yes," she says, "but Daeghun…I feel like, sometimes, he's everything that elves try to hide from the rest of us. I sense it in Elanee, sometimes, when I talk to her, and she starts reminiscing about my childhood—which is strange," and she makes a face, disturbed and wry, "because I had no idea she was watching me—and I can tell she hasn't quite adjusted to the fact that I'm _not_ that little girl anymore. Because it's been such a short time for her, and for me too, but it's also been…my entire life." She looks at him, and her features are lovely, without a trace of any seduction or beguilement. "Elves don't like change. _Especially_ not sudden change. They get very attached to things and can't handle having that attachment sundered. And when my mother and his wife died…Daeghun couldn't handle it, and so he simply shut down. That's why they're so aloof, I think," she says, and she looks down and traces the embroidery on her skirt. "They don't want to be hurt."

"There are other ways to be hurt," he says, still looking at her, thinking of all the ways she has hurt him, whether knowingly or not. Seeing her reopens those wounds, but he had never tried to let them heal in the first place, and the fresh air is good for them. And she is trying, he knows, and he appreciates it, because even if she didn't try he would still be completely at her mercy, and he has come to realize that and accept it. He wonders if she realizes it, and he wonders too if she is at any mercy of his, but she gives no sign and he cautions himself, schooling himself to patience.

"Gods know it," she laughs, but it is not a pleasant laugh, and then she says, "He hurt me, more than I want to admit, with his lack of parenting skills. I had Retta and Bevil and Amie," and these names wash over him, though he has heard them before, but her voice barely quavers over them anymore, "but all the same, I couldn't wait to get away from there, and from _him_ and his disapproval of my 'wild ways.'" She sighs and her lips quirk in a preemptive smile.

"You were a teenager," he offers, though when he was a teenager he was already a squire to Sir Lairon of the Neverwinter Nine, preparing for a war against Luskan and utterly devoted to his lord, his city, and his orders. He thinks of his sister, when she was a teenager, and remembers his utter disdain and disapproval of her wild ways, and his mother laughing at them both, and of other people speaking of their teenage years. He knows he was not a typical teenager, and while part of him is strangely disappointed that she was, he is not surprised.

"Yes," she says, and her eyes are wide and lost in some memory; then she shakes her head and rests it against the chair, staring at the low ceiling. "But it's just funny, now, because it's all gone, and he's all I've got left, and I…don't want to lose that. I was going to wander the world with Amie, and see all its sights, and find all the magic I could, and now…"

"What are you going to do?" he asks, because he wants to know and because the answer does matter. "You're a Knight, a Captain, a hero…"

"Oh, I'm still going to wander," she says, still staring at the ceiling, and his heart sinks. "Kana can handle all those boring duties and the Keep, and Neverwinter doesn't have the best track record with heroes, from what I understand. And I…will wander away, until I've seen enough of the world that this one battle doesn't matter so much anymore, and I can come home and not worry about the past."

Her eyes are suddenly haunted, and he understands perfectly, though he could never imagine wandering away from Neverwinter in order to heal his hurts. The war had stripped a great deal from him, and he has worked hard to win it back, alongside his fellow veterans and soldiers and knights, but he has worked in his city, physically stacking the stones and silently sharing the memories until the buildings stood tall again and the echoing screams of the dying did not haunt his dreams. In helping his city to become all it once was, all and more, he healed that part of himself that had seen the brutality of the "civilized" races, setting his faith in the laws and orders that raised them above orcs, or the other brute races of the world. He does not need to see anything greater, or more fantastic or terrible, to banish the memories; the sight of the common people of his city, walking the streets in safety, is enough to satisfy him.

"Home?" is all he says; he looks at the floor, but sees the halls of the Castle Never.

"Crossroad Keep," she says, with a sad laugh. "I never thought, when I first got here, that this useless pile of stones would be anything more than a burden. But now…" She looks around the room but avoids looking at him; he looks up at the window, through which he can only see the sky, the bright blue slowly fading to violet. "I can't imagine coming back anywhere else."

"I think of the Castle," he admits, "not the house where my mother raised me. I have lived there so long that everywhere else seems…fleeting."

He slowly focuses back on the room, and meets her gaze; she has a queer look on her face, a smile of sorts, and she shakes her head a little and says, "You are _so_ in love."

"I am?" he says, stupidly, for her words have thrown him as she is always able to throw him and he wishes he would stop forgetting his entire lifetime of diplomatic training every time she says something remotely surprising. He blushes and she shakes her head more, and he can't look away from her gaze but he can't meet it, either. He wonders why his heart hammers and why he cannot seem to decide whether or not he wants her to be serious, why he cannot seem to decide if she _is _serious, or not.

"Yes," she says, and after a moment she moves, just a little and with an inherited grace, so that she sits almost next to him. She smiles at him gently, and says, "You're in love with Neverwinter."

"I—yes," he says, staring at her. "Yes, of course I am."

"It's quite admirable, you know," she says, drawing her legs up and tracing an embroidered flower on her knee. "Such sheer loyalty is commendable, I guess, but your dedication shows how much of it you have. But it's also…intimidating. You're so in love with a city that can never love you back, but you seem…happy."

"I am," he says, and he thinks he may never be able to explain this to her, from the way her eyebrows draw together and she looks at him, otherwise impassive. "I am complete. She gives me my purpose."

"That's good," she says, but she looks at her knees again as she says it. He looks at her, wrapped up and small and pale, and a part of him goes very still, and he wonders at his stillness. She is trying not to look at him, obviously aware that he is looking at her, and her hand self-consciously reaches up to brush her hair back behind her ear again. He reaches out and takes it; it is the first time he has touched her since she touched him, and he is aware of this, but more than the memories pressing around his consciousness, he is aware of his stillness; for a moment it overwhelms him, and he simply sits with her hand in his without her permission. When he comes to himself he realizes that she has wormed her other hand into his, and they sit side-by-side, holding hands. She glances up at him, sideways, and he smiles at her and her eyes darken in a familiar way, and yet he doesn't mind because he is too busy at once enjoying her hands in his and also wondering what it would be like to run his hands along her face. Something has shifted; something makes him content, rather than anxious; and he thinks it is that she looks at him, not as a prize to be conquered or an item to be used, but as the man who is sitting next to her, holding her hands.

She sighs, regretfully, and stirs, and says, "The moon's up. I should probably go find out what we're doing tomorrow."

"The moon is up?" He isn't looking at the window, and neither is she.

"Half-half-elf, remember?" she says, laughing, and so he stands and pulls her up as well, smiling again. They both move to bring her hands to his lips, and he kisses them softly, smiling against her skin. He releases her and she steps back, and with a wave of her hand brings the dishes hovering behind her. "I will see you in the morning?"

"Of course," he says, turning as she walks past him, towards the door.

"I'm glad," she says, and smiles at him, and leaves. He sits back in his chair and runs his hands through his hair and then looks at them, thinking of hers and of her smile and of her blessed ancestors who passed on to her their eyes and their skin and their perfectly balanced shape, and of whichever indomitable force gave her its strength in her soul. On his desk are papers and letters and reports and gods only know what else, and he turns his eyes on them, and takes his pen in hand, but mostly he thinks of her, and laughs at himself for his predictability, and smiles.


	10. Chapter 10

**Title**: Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Ten

**Author: **Jade Sabre

**Note:** I very much love my mental image of Tanithar and Nevalle at the end of this chapter. Only four chapters left!

At this point in time I do not know how else to say how much I would appreciate a review—any review—just, let me know if you're reading, and perhaps enjoying. I know it's a busy time of year, but I would be very grateful.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**10**

_and as these shadows fall on me now_

_I will somehow_

Callum's death comes as a complete surprise; he has received word that the dwarf is coming, and has spent the day preparing for his arrival, with the requisite reports carefully inked and his room clean and the best ale he can haggle from the innkeeper waiting in his study, for Callum likes ale to wash down his reports. He does not know Callum as well as he knows others in their ranks—the dwarf prefers field work to city work, while he has always been a city man, but on the occasions that the entirety of the Nine has gathered together he has come to know the dwarf as a fierce brawler and a steady leader. Like all dwarves, he is a rough, brusque speaker, with little patience for diplomacy and small talk, but he is polite in his frankness, and furthermore he has a wicked sense of humor that pairs delightfully well with the mischief of the court's younger members. He is a fellow of the Nine, but Callum is also a friend, and he is looking forward to the visit. He is not as lonely as he was upon receiving the assignment, but the prospect of a truly familiar face is a welcome one. He has letters from Lairon and Darmon for the dwarf as well, and this is what he tells the page boy who has come to tell him that Callum is dead.

The page boy looks completely surprised, and he rubs his face and lets out his breath in a slow count of ten, before dropping his hand and thanking the boy, calmly. The boy holds out a bag: Callum's effects, courtesy of the Knight Captain, who sends her condolences and will come speak with him as soon as she is able. He blows out his breath again and nods his thanks to the boy, who bows and quickly leaves him, alone, with Callum's effects. He sinks into the cushioned chair and closes his eyes, saying a prayer for his fallen comrade and waiting for the mind-numbing shock to wear away; they are at war, after all, and he should not be so surprised to hear of casualties. Yet it does not feel like war: Melia has still not been replaced, since the Knight Captain refused her position, and in desperate times the slot would not be left unoccupied for so long. He and the others have written back and forth about possible candidates, but it is far easier to find a pretty, well-trained fighter to work within the city than it is to find a field commander with Callum's years of experience, and he cannot begin to think of who they might consider in his place. Most of the other generals from the war have retired, and the newest crop of commanders is mostly untested. The dull ache in his heart has started to throb, but he cannot let himself be distracted; he cannot dwell on the fact that he has lost two of his Nine in the past year, and that without anyone to replace them, he simply lives with a void in his heart.

He sighs and opens his eyes and considers the bag in his hands. He does not know much about Callum's family, but he can at least sort through the items and determine which ones ought to be returned, and which can be redistributed. He finds his seal ring of knighthood, his cloak, the many decorations he received as a general, and sets them aside for repackaging, and then draws out a messenger pouch, which he opens. One of the letters is addressed to him; he breaks the royal seal and scans it, then stops and rereads it more carefully, the pouch falling out of his hands as he receives orders he should have had yesterday, or the day before yesterday—any day earlier than the day he receives them. He drops it on his desk and immediately begins scouring his rooms for what he will need—his sword, his cloak, an emergency bag of healing potions he has been saving, his traveling boots. He finds another bag and starts packing, checking and double-checking the status of his belongings. He leaves Callum's bag in his bedroom, because he will not have the time to return to Neverwinter and would rather have it safe here rather than on the battlefield. He packs mechanically, mind furiously racing with what information the others have sent him, already miles away.

"Are you going somewhere?" He freezes and then turns; she leans in his doorway, looking tired, as she usually does right after a battle. There are lines on her forehead and her skin draws tightly across her bones, and her green eyes are dark. He has forgotten she was coming to see him, and wonders what she was expecting to find. She gives no clue; she simply looks tired, wearing robes of deep, calming blue.

"Yes," he says, his surprise wearing away, and he returns to packing. "I've just received orders from Lord Nasher. He has gathered the troops to give a last stand at Highcliff and I am to join him there."

"Highcliff?" she asks, still leaning in the doorway, and he wonders if she sounds disappointed, or if that is merely his imagination.

He nods, and then looks at her, and says, "My lady, please, sit."

She crosses the room in three light strides and practically collapses into her chair, rubbing circles on her temples. "I am so tired of those Shadow Reavers," she says, closing her slanted eyes, and for another moment he pauses in his work and looks at her and wonders if he might do something to comfort her, but then she shakes her head and looks up to him and says, "What's the point of making a stand at Highcliff? The King of Shadows wants _me_."

"He's been marching up the High Road," he says, returning to his packing, pulling on his boots and straightening his tunic, finding his bracers. "He's heading towards Neverwinter, and my lord wishes to give the city time to evacuate. Once—" he pauses and finds a map, and hands it to her, before resuming his packing "—that's been accomplished, we will probably fall back here, ahead of the King of Shadows's army, in time to bolster your defenses."

"Are you sure of that?" she asks, staring at the map before rolling it up and tossing it on his desk.

He frowns at her, then looks down at his bracers, trying to buckle them. "Of course. Lord Nasher has invested a great deal in this Keep, and he has the highest confidence in you. You have our fully pledged support—"

"No," she says, and her voice is quiet. She stands and takes his arm; his fumbling hand drops uncertainly to his side. She speaks with her eyes cast down while she deftly buckles his bracers for him. "Are you so sure he won't obliterate you completely?"

He looks down at her and she steadily looks at her handiwork, avoiding his gaze. "My lady—"

"Your troops aren't prepared to face the shadows. Mine have done practically nothing but train against the warlock's conjurations for months. His army is large, and it will be difficult—"

"My lady," he says again, in what he hopes is a calm voice, though her concern is wreaking havoc with his emotions. It is no longer a matter of simply leaving and returning, of following his duty; it is following his duty, while ensuring that she does not worry, because if she is distracted she will not bother with her Keep and if _he_ is distracted because she is distracted he will not stand a chance of returning. "My lady, Neverwinter's troops are among the finest on the Sword Coast. We have fought Luskans and long-dead lizardfolk and many, many other foes, real and magical," he says, to offset the way her shoulders stiffen; she takes his other arm and does up its buckles, and then simply grips it in her hands, "and while it will be costly, we will return at the end of the day."

"But not victorious."

"No," he says, "but this is not a battle fought for victory. This is a battle for time."

"We need it," she says, and then she looks up at him, and his throat is suddenly tight. He is grateful when she continues, not quite looking at him, "We found the tome we've been looking for, the one that will help us reach the King of Shadows's stronghold. Aldanon just needs time to interpret it. I doubt he'll be done before Garius arrives here, but if we can weaken him—and if you can give us time to work on our end—" Her eyes unfocus, as if she is calculating the odds, the costs and gains, and he is at once relieved to see her thinking like a true commander and worried that she may make the calculations and still choose to ignore them. Then she looks back at him, and meets his gaze, and she says, "I see. You need to go."

"Yes," he says, and he is mostly ready to go, but he is acutely aware of how close she stands, and of her hands on his arm, and his selfishness has cost him nothing so far and he cannot quite bring himself to deny it now, when every second counts. There is a tinge of pink coloring her high cheekbones, and she looks at him and her look is that of the woman he knows, not the flirt or the seductress or the conqueror, but the woman who sometimes brings him dinner, and his lips quirk in a shaky smile. She inhales sharply, and says, "Go, but come back to me."

"I will," he says, but he has, ultimately, no way to assure her—no way to assure himself. He raises his hands and looks at them, empty, when a glint on his left pinky finger catches his eye. He tugs his arm out of her grip and her hands drop, and he pulls the ring off his finger and turns it over in his hand. It is a simple, dull pewter ring, the eye of Neverwinter stamped into the round top. It was the model for his Nine ring, the one they gave him while they cast the gold one he wears on his right ring finger, but he has kept it because it was the first sign of his vow, and he wears it because he likes it for its simplicity. He has grown since he received it, and it no longer fits his ring finger, but it still looks as if it will be too large for the purpose he now wishes it to serve. He wonders why his voice shakes, as he says, "Take this."

"What?" she asks, holding out her hand, and he drops it into her palm.

"My first signet ring," he says. "It's not much, but—I kept it and—I'll be back for it."

"Sir Nevalle," she says, and a playfulness has overcome her serious features, easing the lines in her face, "are you asking me to wear your ring?"

"I—" He is caught in her question and tongue-tied by her beauty, having not thought that deeply about it, remembering again why he so rarely acts on instinct off the battlefield, and he sees in her smile that she knows she has caught him. He wonders if she softens because she is kind, or because they are pressed for time, but in either case she slips the ring on her finger and considers it.

"It's a little loose."

"Your hands are small."

"Yes," she says, and he catches the hand and kisses it. She holds his while her free hand reaches out and summons his pack, which she gives to him. "I'll hold you to that."

"Be well, my lady," he says, and before he can stop himself he bends down and kisses her on the forehead; her hand tightens on his, and then they release each other and go, she to her war room, and he to his horse; but they are both wearing small smiles, and she is wearing his ring.


	11. Chapter 11

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter: **11

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes: **I'm so sorry for the delay; finals have been eating me for the past two weeks. They're still gnawing on my leg, but I'll be free soon. Here is the next baby step for our intrepid hero.

Thanks so much for all the reviews I got on the last chapter; they really meant a lot to me. More would always be appreciated.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**11**

_and I didn't understand_

_when you reached out to take my hand_

He is unaware of the commotion, of the struggles and the yelling; his only thought is to reach his lord and ensure his safety. He hears Alander yelling in his ear and can feel Cadia's hand on his arm and wonders why his feet aren't working, why he seems to be moving _away_ from his destination, not towards it. He revives, a little, and finds himself sitting in a chair in an empty chamber, with Cadia and Alander standing over him, the latter looking anxious, the former sad. He opens his mouth to ask where they are, when the door bursts open and Lairon and Darmon drag in Sigurth, who yells battle cries at the top of his lungs and lunges for the door. Mournee stands in his way, and they throw the dwarf into the chair next to him and Darmon pins him down. The chair creaks alarmingly and he thinks in his stupor that the Knight Captain will not appreciate it if they break her furniture, and then he thinks that she would probably welcome the chance to replace it with something more comfortable and then he realizes that they are in Crossroad Keep and just moments ago he had not known that. From the way Cadia and Alander are watching him he suspects he behaved very much like Sigurth, and winces. He remembers responding to his lord's rallying call, and grabbing his lord as the shadows pressed in; somewhere lurking in his mind is the retreat, and anxious hours spent watching the one surviving cleric do her best, and the last thing he remembers for certain is that they would not allow the Nine to follow into the infirmary, that they separated him from his lord.

"Don't worry about it," Cadia says, as he starts to blush, "it's happened to all of us at one point or another."

"No one can go in? Not even Lairon?" he asks, looking over at the half-elf, the only cleric in their ranks.

The slightly older man shakes his head. "I would rather keep company with you," he says.

Alander's knees suddenly give out, and Mournee catches him under the arms and guides him to another chair. He is very pale, and takes long breaths to avoid fainting. "I've never seen Lord Nasher like that," he says. "Will he be—"

"He will be fine," Cadia says, "though it will take time. I have seen him sustain worse."

"Banning the Nine," Sigurth grumbles, apparently calming. "We're his bodyguards. We're supposed to guard his body, not be shunted off like some common Greycloaks—"

"Those common Greycloaks will very soon be saving our lives," Mournee says sharply.

"_If _they're up to it," Sigurth mutters. "Greenbacks, all of them—"

"They have had extensive training," he interrupts, suddenly defensive. "Their sergeants have created specialized regiments with the sole aim of defeating shadows—"

"Oh yes, Nevalle, break down all the numbers for us, why don't you. Tell me, are they prepared for those damned undead?" Sigurth snarls. "Did you _see _the size of some of them, Nevalle?"

Of course he saw, but Lairon interrupts him. "It is not only the troops who are untried. There is the question of the Keep's command," he says. He has recently been to Waterdeep, requesting help in the upcoming battle, and arrived at Neverwinter just in time for the march to Highcliff. Lairon has been detached from the developments on the northern Sword Coast, and he knows this, but he suddenly does not care, and his hands ball into fists and he prepares to leap from his seat at the slightest provocation. "Honestly, giving command to one whom we only know from the Watch was bad enough, but what my lord was thinking, giving this Keep to an untrained swamp witch? The Waterdhavians were skeptical—"

"You say another word against her," comes an angry voice, and he is surprised and yet not surprised to discover it is his, "and I swear before all the gods—"

But what he swears he does not know, and is saved from answering when the lady in question appears in the doorway. He does not see her, but all the others turn their head to look; and when their eyes briefly meet he sees a flash of relief in hers, and his hands relax. She glances at Sigurth, then flicks her gaze over Darmon and Alander, and spares Lairon a longer, lingering look, and he flinches without realizing it, and wonders if she is really unkind, or if she simply enjoys torturing him. She nods to Cadia and Mournee, and then turns to him, and he strongly suspects the latter.

"You've come back," she says, but he doesn't really hear what she's saying, because even though he is sitting down she is still somehow able to strip him with her eyes, eyes which remind him of her first examination, except for the way she doesn't smile, as she does it. He closes his eyes to avoid seeing her too long—it is like staring into the sun, and he cannot bear the heat—and immediately he returns to the battlefield, and sees his lord, falling because he is not fast enough to reach him. Cadia answers with introductions and thanks for hospitality, but he feels his failure like a physical ache and presses his palms to his eyes.

He hears her say his name, and yet he is unaware of it, until Mournee kicks his ankle and he straightens with a start. "Sir Nevalle," she says, and there is naked concern in her face, "may I have a word with you?"

"Of course, my lady," he says, taking a deep breath to prepare himself, shaking his head slightly at Cadia's amused smile. He rises from the chair and waits a moment to ensure that his legs are, in fact, still functioning, and then he follows her out the door and around the corner. He can see straight over her head and behind her is the room where he knows they are keeping his lord, and his entire body tenses—and stays tense, but for entirely new and conflicting reasons, when she reaches out and takes his hands.

"What's wrong?" she asks, and he cannot believe she is asking.

"My lord," he says, and he cannot speak for another moment. It is not quite panic that wells within him; it is avoidance, a coping mechanism that sees the enormity of his failure and throws up emotion, of any kind, to forestall despair.

"I'm sure you did everything you could," she says, and her voice is low and soothing, and he realizes that she is trying to comfort him and yet it doesn't quite reach through, because he honestly doesn't know what she wants and is afraid that she isn't honest. He realizes dimly that he _is _panicking and that she will be the target of his panic if he isn't careful, but she is holding his hands and he wants to cling to that. So he stands before her, torn, afraid of his lord's death and of rupturing her fragile connection to him, too selfish to save himself from either, and he closes his eyes and brings her hands to his lips, then presses his forehead into them. She releases his hands and then her hands are on his face, and they dispel a little of the panic, replacing it with wonder, wonder at the softness of her hands and at how wonderful they feel, running over the stubble on his cheeks and smoothing away the lines on his forehead. He wonders if it is magic, or love, or both, and if such a combination is possible. Her fingers dance lightly around his temples, brushing back his hair, running along his jaw, down his nose. He inhales sharply as they brush over his lips, and she stops, letting them linger, and his breath leaves him in a shuddering sigh. He has not realized, until now, how bone-weary he is, and her touch makes his bones melt entirely away.

After a moment she begins tracing his face again, more slowly, deliberately, and in a voice to match she says, "The army is on the move, but you beat them by at least a day. We have time…"

His eyes snap open and he looks down at her; her eyes are searching his face, hesitant, but also filled with longing. He opens his mouth to speak and finds that he can't, and closes it and mutely shakes his head. She tilts her head and in an effort to avoid her eyes he catches a glint of light on her finger and sees that she is wearing his ring, that she has apparently shrunk it to her size, but it is there, alongside rings of protection and healing and gods only knew what else, and his chest tightens. "What is it?" she asks, and he wonders if his face does not show it, or if she simply cannot read it.

"My lord," he repeats, and is surprised when she pulls her hands away and steps back.

"Your lord," she spits, and on her face is annoyance, mixed with—something, but he is too stunned to read it. "Oh yes, by all means, spend the rest of your time panicking about Nasher. I'm sure it will do both of you a world of good."

"I—"

"Don't you understand?" she says, and he recognizes plaintiveness mixed with the annoyance. The question surprises him, because he has thought that _she _does not understand, and cannot fathom what it is he is supposed to see. "Do you have any idea how gods-damned _intimidating_ you are?"

He shakes his head, trying to clear it. "I would never hurt—"

"That's not what I mean," she snaps, but her expression relents, a little. "I—tell me, what is Neverwinter?"

He blinks, again thrown by the turn the conversation has taken. "A city?"

"_A _city?"

"My city," he amends, and she nods.

"And what does that mean?"

"I—" He pauses, and then the words spring from him, unbidden, "The place I have sworn to protect. Not just—more than just the buildings. She is her history, her people past and present, and all that she has the potential to become. She is occasionally beaten and occasionally victorious, but always present, and she will exist long after I have gone. She is everything I have striven for, over the course of my life. She is my city." He draws a breath, feels the weight of his words, and finishes quietly, "She is my home."

She smiles at him, so brilliantly and yet so sad, as if she knows something he does not, and so he cannot quite smile back. "Your everything," she says. "Do you realize what that means, ultimately? If you give everything to your city, how can you—" He begins to understand, perhaps, though it still doesn't make sense in his head—his city is everything, his loyalty and his honor and his pride and his joy, but that doesn't exclude _other_ joys in life, though he wonders if he had the time to think whether or not he would find that all his joys eventually return to the city. She breaks off when he nods, just a little, and says pleadingly, "I'm not asking you to choose between the two, because I know who would win that one, but I—"

He places his fingers over her lips, and her eyes flutter close; he wishes to do the same, but keeps them open so he can watch as his fingers trace her features. His hands have never been graceful, but they are strong and they have always served him well; yet they seem thick and unwieldy as they pass over her eyebrows, around her cheeks. Her face is softer than her hands, and pale, and he longs to gather it in his hands; he traces her lips, dark pink against her skin, and longs to kiss them. But now is not the time, because his lord lies in the shadowy land of unconscious health, and he must be prepared to attend his bedside at any moment. Still, she looks incredibly tempting; but he reminds himself that sacrifice always makes the reward sweeter (though he doubts her lips need the sweetening), and regretfully lets his hands drop. She opens her eyes and stares up at him, and for a moment he remembers her lips against his bare skin, and his resolve wavers.

"Attend your lord," she says, and he wonders if he imagines the girlish breathiness in her voice. "I have a war to prepare for, so I can wait, if you insist."

"Thank you," he says, his voice finding itself again, and then he says, "I do."

"Hmph," she snorts, flicking her gaze over him, her smile devoid of sadness and full of mischief. "That's only because you don't know what you're missing." She takes his hand, and kisses it, and he was not aware that lips and tongue could be manipulated so deviously in the innocent act of kissing a hand, and he instinctively rubs it as she drops it and smirks at him, and flounces away. He lets out his breath in a long, careful sigh, and then pauses; when no one appears to take him away, he hesitantly steps in front of his lord's door, and then assumes a guard position beside it. He has refused a cunning, intelligent, beautiful Knight Captain; he'll be damned if they refuse him the ability to wait on his lord.


	12. Chapter 12

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Twelve

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes: **In which I am free from finals, and now present to you chapter twelve of this fic! My deepest sympathies to anyone still enduring them; the end is in sight! (As is the end of this fic, but that's a different story.)

Reviews, as always, are deeply appreciated. I hope you enjoy!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**12**

_you reached out to take my hand_

_and if you have something to say_

_you'd better say it now_

The battle for Crossroad Keep lasts for many hours, the initial bombardment of the night giving way to the more direct attacks of the morning, undead three sizes too large pummeling at the very foundations of the keep's walls. He has memorized the statistics and specifications of the Keep's walls, cannon, soldiers, soldiers' equipment; he knows exactly how many hours a day each man was required to train, how many patrols each squad endured, how many bandits have been killed and captured as a sign of their competency. The only person who knows more than he does about this Keep is Kana, and as his lord requires all of the Nine to attend him personally in his chambers, it is Kana who takes to the battlefield. He spends the battle visualizing every moment of it in his mind, every parry and thrust and advancement and retreat required, while pages (more often than not the dirty urchins the Knight Captain employs as her personal runners) bring hourly updates, which he uses to adjust his mental tallies. Darmon paces, and appropriates Sigurth's beer whenever he can snatch it away from the watchful dwarf; Cadia, strangely enough, braids Mournee's hair, which seems to have a soothing effect on the younger woman. His lord watches them with apologetic eyes, but this battle belongs to the Knight Captain, not to Neverwinter, and in the event of an emergency they will all be needed to force a retreat. Lairon prays for victory, and Alander sharpens his sword; and he sits, running through his knowledge of the statistics of the opposing army and attempting to compare losses. It is difficult to tally shadows, which seem to breed and multiply and then congeal, an ever-shifting mass, and for all he knows Garius can raise his monstrous undead from the Keep's fallen soldiers. But it is easier to estimate and fall into endless calculations than it is to dwell on his inactivity, and on the endless activity of the Knight Captain.

The fall of the gate surprises them all, and his lord immediately begins roaring curses at the poor page, demanding to know who the blackguard is ("A ranger, my lord") and why in the Nine Hells the Knight Captain kept him around ("He's one of the most skilled trackers on the Sword Coast, my lord") and what in the Nine Hells the Knight Captain plans to do now ("Fight, I suppose, my lord"). He receives many baleful glares over the course of the next hour, although he has only answered as truthfully as she has told him. The next report brings news that, impossibly, the courtyard holds, although it is allegedly a blackened pit rather than a verdant pasture. He knows the Knight Captain rains death upon the ground, although it is hard for him to visualize the diminutive object of his affections as an intimidating rainer of death. He prays in his mind, not as obviously as Lairon, but no less devoutly, and finally a page brings the impossible news that Black Garius has retreated, and without further word he pushes past the pageboy and runs down the crowded halls of the Keep—which is truly a refugee camp, at this late hour, and he passes many women and children huddled in the corners, waiting for the sun to shine. He has no thought to spare for the past, now, and only slows when he reaches the entrance atrium, when he hears a matched set of footsteps running after him.

Cadia smiles at him as he turns back, and says, "You left so quickly my lord did not have time to tell you to pass his congratulations onto the Knight Captain."

He blushes and nods shortly, and her smile widens. "I am sorry," he says, and she waves it away.

"I understand. We still need to find the King of Shadows himself, but—"

"I believe they have been working on that," he says, and they push past the blockade on the front door and then stop on the entrance steps, staring down the hill.

"I can't say I like what she's done with the place," Darmon says behind them. The entire courtyard is indeed a blackened pit, the ground burned and pebbled, the closest buildings scorched. The air smells of smoke and ozone, and the lingering stench of undead, and soldiers still hack away at the remnants of the retreating enemy forces. It looks to be an utter wasteland, and yet there remain bright patches of color amidst the gloomy grey. The Knight Captain and her companions stand in a cluster before the gate, and the sight of her standing below finally spurs him into action; Cadia and Darmon follow as he trots down the hill, not quite willing to run but unable to walk either. The knot of adventurers—all splattered with undead gore and blood and soot—tightens as it sees the knights approach, and then the Knight Captain ducks out from behind her paladin and her warlock and smiles briefly at them, but there is little mirth in her smile and he barely has time to assess her injuries—spurious, if any—before she shoulders past them and starts up the hill. They immediately turn to follow, with her companions quickly pulling up the rear, their normal jostling for position replaced with a battle-weary march.

"This is a great victory you have won, my lady," Cadia says, her voice a soothing balm against the harsh crunching of the gravel beneath their feet. Not for the first time, he thinks that Cadia must have had bardic training in her past. "Your leadership has saved the Keep and surpassed anyone's wildest hopes."

"It won't last," Darmon interrupts, casting a glance behind him as if he can see past the tall, upstanding walls. "The army is still out there, and as long as the King of Shadows still stands—"

"Hush," the elf admonishes him, "lest the soldiers hear you. This victory gives them hope; it gives us all hope. Do not cloud it with—"

"The truth?" The Knight Captain's voice contains more steel than he would have thought possible in a woman so set against blades and shields. As if to reinforce this paradox, the Sword of Gith hangs, unused, in a scabbard by her hip, and she wears thick robes, not a more practical battle mage tunic. "He is right. We haven't truly won anything today. We've got to find the King of Shadows and defeat _him_ if we want this to be over."

"And you will," Cadia says as they reach the Keep itself.

Alander meets them at the door. "They say the sage has finally found something useful," he says. "My lord sends word that he would like to witness his knight's departure."

The knight in question runs a hand over her face and sighs. "Half an hour," she says, turning to her companions. "The entrance hall, in half an hour. I shall see you all then." She catches his gaze and smiles more genuinely before brushing past them; her companions dissipate, off to set their affairs in order before departing on a doomed mission. He returns to his lord's chambers and assists his lord in coming down to the entrance hall, where Alander has prepared a proper chair for the lord of all Neverwinter. He stands next to his lord, with the other Nine circling behind them, assuming his typical military pose and perfect stillness as others slowly file into the room: the sage himself, accompanied by a young assistant; the Keep's lieutenant, looking particularly forbidding in her bloodstained armor; the tiefling, looking pale but prepared, and the dwarf, trying to comfort her with jokes. He hates the stillness, as it only puts his mind in further turmoil; without the promise of battle to come, he has no way of calming his mind, of focusing his concentration. The future is full of unknowns, of perhaps and maybes, and he knows it is not his fight and that there is absolutely nothing he can do to turn the tide. The only strategy they have—and he gathers this, from listening to the sage explain to the gathered hosts of the Keep—is to send the Knight Captain and her companions into the heart of enemy territory and pray to the gods that they survive. They have no statistics, no estimates, no inkling of what they might face, only their own strength on which they—and all those they fight for—can rely.

She swallows this with what looks like resignation—and ultimately, they all knew this would happen, that in the end it would be impossible to know—and he watches as she turns to offer her companions a chance to leave, and smiles as they instantly refuse, as he knew they would. She speaks to her commander, and her master builder, and to the urchin ringleader, her every step and word containing a measured grace devoid of the contrariness that defined her earlier career. She makes her farewells with the dignity befitting a Knight Captain of Neverwinter, which makes him smile with pride, and the dignity befitting a powerful, talented sorceress, which softens his smile as she comes to speak to his lord. She has changed robes yet again and now wears the more practical tunic and pants in the deep, soothing blue that he has come to prefer, the bright yellow of her cloak of knighthood hanging over her shoulders. She stands before his lord and accepts Nasher's words of blessing with an inclined head, and although he cannot see he knows she smiles sardonically because she cares for the blessing of no lord, and then she stands before him, and he finds he does not know what to say.

"Look after my Keep for me, will you?" she says, cocking her head to the side a little, smiling to put him at ease. "The army will be back, and I expect to find that the walls have held in my absence."

"Of course, my lady," he says, nodding his head. He is aware of the burning stares of his comrades on his back, and of his lord's impatient presence beside him, and fears that he is unable to express to anyone, even himself, the enormity of this moment. He tries to think of something to say, when she lifts a hand expectantly; he takes it without thinking, an automatic, courtly gesture, though he is infinitely aware of how soft her fingers are in his hard grip. Yet as he raises it to his lips he sees his ring sparkling on her little finger, and as his lips meet her skin he moves them soundlessly, and _feels_ the thrill shudder through her; he raises his head, and still holding onto her hand, says, "Come back safely, my lady."

"Oh, I don't know," she says, still playful, though a little strained beneath that, and his lips quirk in a smile again at her attempt. "I want to wander, you see, and I don't know of anything pressing that would bring me back here. Do you?"

He looks down at her, and for a moment does not know who he sees: a meaningless temptress, a headstrong girl, a sorceress with unearthly power, a woman who simply wants to wander and then return. He does not know what her words mean, or what she wants, or whether everything he has wanted to say is suddenly rendered hollow in the face of her superficiality, if she was ever superficial or if that is, in fact, all there is. Her green gaze is entirely unhelpful, and he stares at her and spirals into self-doubt, drowning in his panic, and he does not know what to say. She waits as seconds slip by, and he inhales and suddenly, he _knows_, and instead of saying a word, bows his head and kisses her on the lips.

Her lips are as soft as they appear, and he finds himself cradling her head gently, so gently, for she seems so fragile in his hands and even as he wants—everything—her fragility gives him pause. She, on the other hand, has no such qualms, and wraps her arms around his shoulders—he can feel her hands on his neck and his eyes, already closed, roll back in his head. She stands on her tiptoes and presses harder, and his lips willingly part to catch hers and he _feels _her smile and laughs into her mouth, putting one arm around her waist and drawing her close, his other hand stroking her cheek gently. She fits snugly against him, and as he ends the kiss he presses his forehead against hers and puts his other arm around her, holding her so near he practically draws her off the ground; her hands tighten their grip on his shoulders, and he is hardly aware of the precious seconds ticking by while she lingers in his arms, sinking into every crevice and filling him completely.

"I can't say," he finally says, bowing his head further so that his lips are near her ear, "that anything comes to mind."

Her head rests on his chest and her shoulders shake with laughter and he smiles, pressing a kiss to the crown of her head. His eyes involuntarily flick upward, taking in the faces—alternately amused or surprised—of some of the witnesses, and he feels his cheeks heating. Looking back, he sees her looking up at him, a little uncertain and yet tenuously happy, and he takes both her hands and presses kisses to them, then holds her out at arm's length. Letting go, he is discovering, is a difficult process, especially when she insists on threading her fingers with his and smiling at him as if she cannot believe, in this moment, that she should be so very happy.

"Come back to me," he says; and she squeezes his hands, and says, "I will."


	13. Chapter 13

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Thirteen

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I apologize for the delay in posting this chapter; I had absolutely no time before graduation, and now that I'm back home looking for a job, my internet access has decreased dramatically. We're almost done! I hope you enjoy the chapter.

Reviews would be a precious pick-me-up whilst I face the dreariness of today's job market.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**13**

_when I get really lonely and the distance calls its only silence_

_I think of you smiling with pride in your eyes, a lover that sighs_

Death is easier to report when there is a body, cold and stiff and bloodless, and easier still when one has seen the body fall, seen the blow that broke muscle and sinew and bone and something more subtle, the thread binding soul to flesh. Without such concrete evidence, it is easier still to go on believing that somewhere, somehow, someone goes on living much as they did the last time they were seen; days may turn to weeks and months, but someday someone will come wandering through the gates, and the work in the meantime is simply prolonged preparation for their homecoming. And so he works, first defending the Keep's walls; then, after the dissolution of the King of Shadows's army, rebuilding those walls. Eventually that, too, has been accomplished, and his lord calls him home; and it is then that the doubt creeps in, merely delayed by the physical labor, not dissipated. He refuses to attend the memorial service for the "late" Hero of Neverwinter, rather the latest in a long, proud tradition of Heroes who disappear at their own convenience—or the convenience of their lord. While he does not believe his lord to be as ruthless as that, he cannot deny that it is easier to bring the Keep to heel without its whimsical mistress, just as he cannot deny that he thinks something of its spirit goes missing without her guidance. Alive—no, not alive—_present_, her decisions had often caused him much frustration, as one day she would abide peaceably by the laws, and the next she would be pardoning criminals and easing tax rates; but the frustration is infinitely preferable to the silent obedience that comes from a Keep with no Knight.

Still, his lord finds work to occupy him in Neverwinter, and his duties are just as meaningful as they have ever been, and the sense of fulfillment from serving his city is just as strong, even though the desk work is just as tedious and the nobles are just as uncooperative. He loves his city, warts and all, and often finds himself restlessly wandering her streets, watching her people live their lives unaware of many but the most basic of cares. It is like coming back to an old friend after a long separation; his time at the Keep has changed both himself and his city, but within her walls he still finds the same peace, the same happiness. He avoids the Docks, because the peace there is too new and too tenuous and too much a reminder of a young Watch lieutenant flicking her eyes over him and reducing him to a prize calf with a single glance, but in the other districts he walks every street until he has rememorized even the cobblestones beneath his feet. Part of him realizes he searches for something, and another part whispers of the futility of this search, but he ignores both of them and concentrates on absorbing his city. It fills every crevice it has always filled; yet part of him thinks some new crack has opened, one not so easily closed, but he ignores it, and waits for news.

The Nine rebuild their numbers, slowly; Melia is finally replaced, nearly a year after her death, by a young woman named Aimee, a spellsword with the requisite pretty face and the unusual honor of hailing from Waterdeep. He knows her first through her marriage to his childhood neighbor, who perished in the late stages of the plague, and secondly through her training, which he supervises alongside Darmon and Cadia. Her loyalty to her adopted city is unquestioned, as is her skill with blade and magic; and he likes her, well enough, but her pretty face makes him long for other pretty faces, and he finds himself avoiding her, much to his chagrin. For Callum, no one has been found, though this is mostly because the army is still regrouping from the battle of Highcliff, and the generals have not had time to nominate those of their own who might make field captains worthy of following the dwarf's footsteps. Luckily, Luskan still wars with Ruathym, and the orcs of Old Owl Well remain set against each other, and thus there is little field work to be done. The Nine draw together within Castle Never, encircling their recovering lord, and reknitting the bonds that hold them together as comrades, and as friends. Aimee is far more serious than her pretty countenance belies, and occasionally he glimpses her gaze as he sits on the other side of the room and watches Sigurth and Darmon tease Alander, pointing out their newest addition's pretty face and watching the younger man turn red. He suspects that Cadia is the one who tells her about the Keep and its Captain, for the spellsword never attempts to interrupt his solitude; in any case, the elf is the only one to broach the subject with him, and he listens to her long enough to tell her that he as yet sees no reason to grieve. He sees compassion in her eyes, but she respects his wishes, and his happiness in fulfilling his duties in the city seems to convince the others that he is in fact fine, and so they laugh and joke around him, and he joins in, and sometimes forgets that he thought anything was missing.

His lord, either in a fit of pity or out of simple necessity, sends him to the Keep for a routine inspection, and the others each offer to go in his stead; but part of him misses the Keep, and so he gently thanks them and goes himself. It is much the same as when he left, although he sees fewer hints of the lax discipline that prevailed under previous leadership and more signs that Neverwinter sergeants train the troops, rather than a ragtag mixture of sergeants and freelance adventurers. Kana takes him on a tour of the entire Keep, and gives him detailed statistics about its income and garrison and outlying lands, and is every inch the professional soldier he remembers. The old sergeants nod respectfully as he passes, and the Master Builder shows him plans for another expansion to the walls, and part of him revels in their sense of excitement, of hope for the future. It reminds him of his lands: his family's estate, to be sure, but still lawfully granted him upon his achievement of knighthood, a place he entrusts to his mother's care so that he might spend all of his time in the city. It has been over a year since he has made the journey south to survey them, though his mother has come to the city in that time; he thinks when he returns he will ask his lord for a reprieve, and visit her. For a moment he fancies telling her about the Knight Captain, and sudden desire that the two women meet overtakes him; but he sternly pushes it aside, and concentrates on the plans.

Still, when Veedle mentions the Knight Captain by name, he flinches; and as he recovers he sees Kana watching him, though she says nothing, merely continuing the tour. He eats dinner in the mess hall, and most of the men remember him well enough to speak freely, and he learns much about the mundane workings of the Keep. Everything appears to be working as clockwork, smooth and with only a steady hum of life, and he tells Kana this, as she escorts him to his chambers, complimenting her leadership and her level-headedness. She swallows it with a single nod, and stops outside the door to his room, and says, "Sir Nevalle."

"Yes?" he asks, wondering what early soldier's time she will request to meet him in the morning.

There is something alien to her expression, however, and he cannot quite put his finger on it. She says, "We sent out a team of the best scouts in the area to comb the Mere. All they found was a pile of rubble. Daeghun remains, still searching, but otherwise, there was no trace of the Knight Captain, or her companions." He realizes she is looking at him with pity, and that the strange tremor in her voice is gentleness, as she says, "If they survived the rockfall, they did it through magic so powerful that they are planes away. _If_."

His throat is suddenly dry, but his voice takes over, sounding faint and far away: "Where?"

"I will have a map for you in the morning. Good night," she says, and she clicks her heels and bows and strides off, again a professional soldier, and he tries to fall asleep as quickly as possible, to forestall his own anxiety and to bring the morning as fast as it may come. He wakes before dawn and finds the map sitting on his bedside table, and so he dresses and stops by the kitchen before heading down to the stables and saddling his horse. He is riding south by sunrise, following the High Road down to the edges of the Mere, then dismounting and leading his horse down the unsteady trail he finds on the map. He is no navigator, and the way is treacherous, but he has no time to stop and consider what he is doing. He moves as quickly as possible amidst the tangled roots and sinkholes and bubbling nastiness of the swamp, avoiding looking too deeply into the water's depths. Twice he has to tie a handkerchief around his horse's eyes to lead her past a particularly shadowy area, and once he sees lizardfolk, watching him from a safe distance, but they either recognize the insignia on his tunic or else don't find him appetizing enough to be worth the trouble. The sunlight filters through the trees, coming out a dull, murky green rather like the moss beneath his feet, and the stray bird call is rare enough that he starts every time he hears it. Once he overcomes his initial surprise, he remembers what a blessing these birds are, a sign of life returning to the shadowed realm, and smiles grimly.

He slows as he begins approaching the ruins; at first it is simply a large, carved rock, out-of-place among the duller stones, but gradually columns and pillars begin taking shape. The ground here is more consistently solid—it must be, or else the stones would have long since sunk into the swamp—yet he still hesitates. He finds a conveniently flat boulder and sits down to eat for the first time that day, watching his horse and trying to think of nothing, or if not nothing, then solely the numbers Kana gave him, organizing his report in his head. His horse paws at the ground and sniffs at the moss before rejecting it in favor of nosing her master's shoulder; smiling again, he holds out an apple, which she happily chews. She constantly shifts her weight, however, and he knows she is not comfortable here, and that he should not linger too long. With a sigh, he dusts off his hands and stands, taking her bridle and pulling her along with him as he steps towards the larger piles of stones he sees in the distance.

He checks his map, and knows this must be the place, and yet he cannot, at first, accept this; and he is a man who prefers to believe what he sees. Yet this pile of rubble—what must have once been a large building, now reduced to broken stone and creeping decay—seems such an unfitting mausoleum—his mind shies away from the word and he numbly steps forward, dropping his horse's bridle in order to have both hands free. For what purpose, he does not know; he soon finds himself scrambling over the rocks, trying to find some loose stone to budge, but they are all too large and too heavy for him to lift on his own, and finally he just climbs to the top and walks the length of it, his eyes fixated on his feet. He realizes he might be walking over her grave, and wonders if it is possible for a spirit to shudder, and stops himself angrily; she is one of the most powerful sorceresses he has ever met, and surely she had some magic that could save herself and her companions, surely—

He sees its corner, fluttering, and he slides down the rock pile and shoves aside the smaller stones, ignoring the scrapes on his hands, until he has cleared enough away to see what has caught his eye. It is pinned under a larger rock, and that too he rolls out of the way, his mind cursing even as his lips remain closed, as if he cannot bear to break the silence, even to himself. Its last edges remain trapped under a rock too large to move, and so he tugs at it until he hears the satisfying _rip _of cloth and he holds in his hands the ripped, bloodstained, dusty cloak of a Knight of Neverwinter.

His first thought is surely, surely it came off during the battle, surely it would not have made it so close to the surface without its mistress nearby unless she had discarded it in order to get away—but the bright yellow cloth in his hands is compelling, and he cannot look away from the simple, unutterable truth it conveys. He traces the bloodstains with his fingers—old blood, dull brown—and feels its silken threads rough with pebbled dust, and in his mind's eye he sees her standing before him with a smile, the cloak on her back, sees her running her hands over it after he gives it to her, sees her _hands_, feels them in his in place of the silk, which he crushes in his clenched fists without further notice. The crack in him widens, revealing a deep chasm, from the deaths of his Nine to the feeling, however brief, that something _fit_ in his life, something new and unexpected, the way she _fit _in his arms and her hands _fit _in his hands and now all he has is the space where she was and a bloodstained cloak to fill it and he hears his own hoarse shout and then he feels the tears running down his face, and he is sitting alone on a pile of rubble, clutching a worthless bit of cloth to his chest and crying, unable to articulate his pain or his grief or his _emptiness_, knowing only that she is gone, gone beyond his reach, and there is a chasm in his heart where she should be instead.

He does not know how long he sits there, long after the tears have stopped, sniffing, running the cloak over and over in his hands, marveling at his inner verbosity as he thinks of everything he has never said, everything he can no longer say, hiccupping sobs as the grief catches his breath and starts the process again. The light filtering through the trees grows dimmer, and he knows he cannot risk staying the night; yet he does not know how to stand, or take the first step away from this place. This place is her grave, and it is the only place he can still be near her, and he does not want to leave, though the practical part of him tells him that she is neither here nor there, that she is far and away and there is nothing more he can do for her here. He falls back on his practicality, allowing it to take control while the rest of him sits in shock, mourning, and somehow he finds his horse and takes her bridle and leads her away from this place of death; yet every step he takes away solidifies his emptiness. Every step away is confirmation, is a reminder that she will never step away again, and he unknowingly cries, pressing his head against his horse's neck and trusting her to step surely when he can no longer see the path through his tears.

It is dusk when they reach the outskirts of the swamp and find the road, and he swings his leg over the saddle and clucks the reins, his face expressionless, the cloak clenched in his hands. He takes a deep breath of air, fresh and clean after the stagnant swamp, and it clears his head, a little; and the night sky is cloudless, and the stars shine down, and he thinks, for a moment, of his city, and without further consideration alters his course. He will see his lord, long enough to request leave to see his mother; he will visit his lands, long enough to remember that he owns something for himself; and then he will go home, and work until his wounds have healed. He knows this pain is different, for he is different, but he also knows, with absolute certainty, that the only way to heal himself is to remind himself that there is more, so much more, to his life than his own pain and concerns, and that there is _good_ to be done; and with this in mind, he rides his horse to Neverwinter.


	14. Chapter 14

**Title:** Falling Slowly

**Chapter:** Fourteen

**Author:** Jade Sabre

**Notes:** I have dragged my heels on posting this, but today is the day, because I began this story exactly two years ago, on the edge of June 6th and June 7th, 2008. Here is the culmination of two years of writing and editing, listening to the _Once _soundtrack on repeat and gnashing my teeth while trying to keep the tone consistent; and so now I present it to you, and hope you enjoy it; this is the last chapter to review, so if you've been reading, and enjoyed it, it would validate years of work for me to hear from you.

I recommend listening to the aforementioned soundtrack, as well as the song "Harbor" quoted before chapter one, because they are both one way of telling this story, the ending of which I humbly present to you.

To all of you who havereviewed, and favorited, and author-alerted: I cannot thank you enough. Sometimes I wish I'd been bitten by the story bug for a larger fandom, but your reviews are each so individually good that they more than make up for it. I appreciate it so very, very much.

And finally, once again, to Quark, dearest beta and bestest friend: I'm glad you liked it.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, other than the ones I made up, who still belong to a world created by other people.

* * *

**14**

_take this sinking boat_

_and point it home_

_we've still got time_

He returns to the Keep from time to time—he has the closest ties to it of any of the Nine, and as the months roll by he finds the journey less painful, and often looks forward to his single ale on the house—poured by Sal and shared with the sergeants—and the growth of the soldiers who keep watch over the walls, which always seem to have some new protrusion every time he visits. While Veedle pays attention to the roads, and oversees the construction of the buildings which expand past the boundaries, his pride and joy is improving the walls, and his reward is hearing tales of implementations of his designs in Neverwinter herself. He is happy to bring these tales to the Master Builder, and just as happy to escape the lectures on the man's latest ideas. He is happy to attend a wedding, a year and a half later, seeing cool, crisp Kana married to the steadfast, obstinate Bevil Starling—a match he does not pretend to understand, but one which he can commiserate with, although in the first months of their happiness he cannot completely hide the pangs in his heart. The chasm remains, though he has covered the crack with mortar and sealing wax, and he is, generally speaking, content.

He has ample time to see to his affairs, from spending months on his estate to visiting his sister in Waterdeep a year after the final battle. Seeing her happily married to a man only a few years her elder fills him with peace; she is all froth and light, his little sister, a pretty girl—young woman, and he wonders if this happened while he was at the Luskan front, as he always does when he sees her—with a wide smile and a generous heart. He is fortunate enough to be her adored elder brother, which does not spare him from her teasing, but his brother-in-law often takes his side in their verbal spars, which causes his little sister's cheeks to flush and gives him the opportunity to sit back and watch them argue over insignificant matters with the tenderest ("…as anyone who wasn't as thick-skulled as a troll would _clearly_ see"), most loving ("as a woman, my dear, it's to be expected you wouldn't actually under—ow!") words. He has an unfortunate habit of laughing, which interrupts their bonding, but he guesses that something must show in his face, because his sister rarely pesters him about bringing home a wife of his own, so that she will not be so outnumbered on his visits. He tells her, upon his departure, that she is a fine lady, a wonderful housemistresses, and every bit the sort of woman he hoped she would be; she blushes and hugs him close, and says, "Goodbye, brother," in a suspiciously emotional voice; but she does not cry, and he returns to Neverwinter with a light heart.

The Nine replace Callum with Andrey Ballard, although it takes a great deal of prodding and nigh-blackmailing to convince the old war hero to take the post; his squadmates become his personal captains, dispatched to every corner of the land while he attempts to rebuild his contacts from the safety of the Castle. Lairon travels to Luskan to report on its war with Ruathym, while Aimee immerses herself in the world of the Moonstone Mask and the nobility, learning to become just another pretty face and gather covert information. Darmon continues to lead the Greycloaks within the city, while Alander takes the job of supervising the Watch and Sigurth assists Ballard; Cadia remains the closest to their lord, while he and Mournee spend their time overseeing the more undercover aspects of guarding the city. The occasional cult to Cyric attempts to rise within the crypts, and of course the nobles are always feuding in a quiet, underhanded way, but for the most part the city is at peace, a long-awaited, well-earned peace, and his duties extend mostly to the formal aspects of being a Knight of Neverwinter.

Yet he still reports on Crossroad Keep, and that is why he is there to gather information for his six-month report, trying to avoid staring at Commander Kana as she calmly welcomes him as if nothing has changed since her wedding. Bevil is less contained; he claps the knight on the back and excitedly babbles about the plans he has for the son or daughter Kana so obviously carries. He congratulates them both, although Kana gives him a deadly stare as he does so; the general air of the Keep is festive, however, and he later joins several of the other sergeants in giving Bevil a time-honored, good-natured ribbing over a pint of ale in the Phoenix Tail. It is good to be back, he thinks, casting an eye over the crowded common room with only the slightest twinge that the former mistress is not here to learn of her friend's good fortune. And Bevil, too, in the course of the increasingly inebriated evening, remembers her, with a toast for the good Knight Captain, without whom he'd never left home and never met the woman of his dreams. "And his nightmares," mutters Jalboun, only to receive a swat from Katriona that misses his face and thumps his shoulder instead. They laugh, and eventually they stumble back up the hill to the Keep, and Bevil helps him to his room, and he manages to make it to his bed before passing out.

He wakes the next morning and immediately regrets it; light streams in past the open curtains of his window, and his head aches fiercely. It has been some time—years, if he stops to think—since he has had a proper hangover, and through the foggy haze of pain and deep unhappiness he remembers why he tries to avoid them. He finds himself missing Sand, of all people, for he has heard tale of the wizard's hangover cures, although the thought of actually asking him for such a brew makes him laugh and immediately wince. Bereft of his old opponent and sometimes-friend, he makes do with dressing himself and very carefully walking through the halls of the Keep, attempting to look as dignified as possible when every step makes his stomach churn and he really would rather go back to sleep until the pounding in his head subsides. Thankfully, relief awaits him at the breakfast table; an equally-haggard-looking Bevil slips him a potion under the table while Kana's back is turned, and from the terrified look in the man's eyes he takes the vial and resolves to use it after he has eaten. He watches, curious, as the paranoia in the other man's eyes disappears as soon as he matches gazes with his wife, and how they both seem to soften, ever-so-slightly, before returning to their professional demeanors. He smiles to himself, and after making promises to meet the commander on the walls, and slips out to take the potion. Its effects take a few minutes to settle, but soon his head is clear, and he feels ready to climb the walls.

Kana preemptively puts an end to any line of questioning concerning her personal wellbeing by taking him on laps of the walls at a pace faster than he would have thought a woman in her condition could manage. There is a certain waddle to her stride, but other than that she remains the graceful commander he has come to know, and he pays close attention as she takes him along the eastern wall and explains the latest petition to clear the trees and begin construction of yet another farming village. A pageboy—most of the street urchins have been assimilated, although they maintain a habit of streaking their faces with dirt in order to differentiate themselves from the more nobly-born runners—cautiously interrupts the tour with an urgent message for the commander, and she excuses herself, leaving him to bite his lip as she waddles away and hide his grin at the thought of the mighty Kana so soft and rounded, when her every word and action shows that she is still the hard-edged, disciplined warrior she has always been. He looks out, past the trees, towards the mountains that rise in the distance, wondering where the boundary of the Keep's lands lies. His own lands lie farther to the south and east, almost bordering the Mere, his own modest fortress situated atop the highest of the many foothills near the Sword Mountains. He runs a hand over the wall and thinks of his own quarries, mentally tallying the reports he has received from his mother, trying to decide if there will be enough stone to donate some to Veedle—quietly, of course—after they meet the latest order from Waterdeep.

So lost is he in his calculations that the pageboy must repeat his name twice before he realizes he is being called and turns to hear the message that Kana has urgently requested his presence in the entrance hall. He nods and returns to his thoughts, trusting his feet to lead him automatically to the front doors of the Keep—significantly upgraded, as they are every time he sees them; the gilt has been there for some time, but he thinks the tiny jewels in the Neverwinter Eye are new—and through, where he executes a perfunctory bow to the commander and asks if there has been some unforeseen problem. Kana, her eyes suspiciously bright—or it would be suspicious, if he had ever even remotely considered the possibility of tears in her eyes—nods brusquely across the room, and he turns, and he stops. He stops moving, stops calculating, stops thinking, stops _breathing_. Which makes sense, because he must be dead, because there is no other possible explanation for what he sees, though he is remarkably aware of his tight chest and clenched fists for someone who ought to, by all rights, be incorporeal.

Yet there she is, laughing, and in that sound—a sound which requires a working mind, breath from the lungs, and most importantly a good heart—he realizes he is not hallucinating, and he is not dead—and neither is she.

She turns her gaze on him and he finds his chest is tight again for entirely different reasons, and she smiles shyly, but he cannot speak. He looks between her and Kana, and then fixes his gaze on her, drinking in the sight of her, unable to do anything but stare.

Kana thankfully interprets his look and says, "She just strolled right up to the gates with the others and asked to be let in. Apparently the blue one is—"

"Gannayev," she says, nodding, and he finally tears his gaze away from her and realizes that she is not alone. The man is, in fact, blue, and despite this is also dangerously handsome; near him also stands a woman whose tattoos mark her as a Red Wizard of Thay, and, bizarrely enough, Khelgar and Neeshka; the dwarf eyes the room with stereotypical dwarven disapproval of workmanship, while the tiefling looks as if she can't decide what to take first. He opens his mouth, finds he still has no words, and nods his head to them, instead.

The blue man laughs. "You never mentioned your friends were so shy, Tanith," he says, with a dangerously handsome smile. He cannot help but wince, slightly, but then she speaks and all his cares disappear in favor of concentrating on the smooth sound of her voice.

"Be kind, Gann," she chides, a teasing(ly flirtatious? Gods, he hopes not, but his knees are weak anyway) tone in her voice. "After all, I've just come back from the dead. Remember how shocked Khelgar was? Nearly cleft me in two with his axe, he did, before I convinced him it was really me."

She smiles at him as she says this, inviting him to share in her mirth, and his face wobbles into something resembling a smile, as though he can't quite remember how to do it—and he can't, because his shock is melting away and every kind of anxiety he can possibly imagine is taking its place. Her smile twitches in return, and she quickly turns back to her companions. "Well, then! Would you like the grand tour now, or later? And Kana—" she is all mischief and smiles "—_what_ happened to you?"

"Your damned Harborman happened," Kana says, and he cannot take this amount of shock in one day and his legs abruptly cease working beneath him and he finds himself sitting on the floor. He blinks, as the impact seems to have finally cleared his head, but before he can rise she is leaning over him, and her expression is gentle as she cups his face in her _hands_ and he closes his eyes to steady himself before opening them and examining her more closely. There are new lines etching themselves onto her face, worry lines that even the King of Shadows hadn't produced, but they are still very faint; her eyes are darker than he remembers, and wiser, and she is still so _very_ lovely.

"You seem to have fallen down," she says, and despite the changes in her face, her voice remains the same, and this fills him with hope.

He says the first thing that comes to mind. "What Sand wouldn't have given to see _that_."

She laughs, her smile wide and brilliant, and he wants to take her hands and kiss them, but he is suddenly too shy, unsure as to what changes have been wrought in her, and instead he carefully climbs to his feet. He is aware of the others laughing, but mostly he is aware of her hands, and how they drop away as he stands, and the stab of disappointment that runs through him. He has a brief flash of irritation—he wishes he would make up his mind, and either take her into his arms and kiss her or else desist in his habit of not functioning every time she moved—and then she has slipped her hand into the crook of his arm and looks up at him with another heart-stopping smile (at this rate, _he _will be the dead one, and she will be the one left to mourn mistakenly, should she so choose) and says, "Well, Sir Nevalle, will you show me how my Keep has fared in my absence?"

"Certainly, my lady," he says, forcing himself to be professional, falling back on years of training and protocol practice to guide him while his conscious dwells on her voice saying his name, examining the two syllables—two and half, really, the way she stretches out the double "l" sound—for any clue into her psyche, though he is well aware that women are generally unfathomable and that his attempts are futile, but this does not stop him from turning it over and over again in his mind, savoring a sound he never thought he would hear again in his life. He wonders if the others, following, realize this; the dwarf and the tiefling almost certainly remember their parting before the King of Shadows, but the other two—especially the blue man, whose gaze lingers on the Knight Captain with more than simple flirtation in mind—are as much a mystery to him as he must be to them. He shows her the Keep, and she acts as though little has changed—as though she has not been dead for two years—but she has always been cheerful and cheeky around everyone, and what little knowledge he gained is now lost in a sea of hesitation and floundering confusion. He does not know how to convince her to speak to him alone, just as he does not know what she is thinking or whether or not she longs to link arms with Gannayev instead or if it is yet safe to consider opening himself again, even just a little.

Bevil, straightforward, bull-headed Bevil, is the one who presents them with the opportunity, though it is not until the next day and he has been forced to sit through dinner and watch her interact with the others while he attempts to make conversation with the Red Wizard—Safiya—which is awkward, at best, as the Red Wizards have been banned from Neverwinter soil for many, many years, and while he has no doubt that she is a kind woman, old prejudices die hard, and she seems just as ill at ease talking to a bodyguard. He spends the morning with Kana, again, while the Knight Captain wanders the Keep telling her friends tales of her adventures there, and the commander kindly does not comment on his inability to concentrate on any one set of statistics for an extended period of time. Then, just as they turn towards the mess hall for lunch, Bevil appears and takes his wife by the arm and insists that he needs her presence immediately, to deal with some pressing matter he refuses to elaborate. Kana gives her husband a look that suggests he is lying and will boil in oil for it, but he stands his ground and suggests that the amused knight go to his room in the Tower, so that Kana may find him quickly, once the pressing matter has been dealt with.

So he finds himself sitting on the floor in his old study, for in his absence no one has taken his place and the furniture—all but the obnoxiously pink-and-sparkly overstuffed armchair—has been carried off where it is needed. The bright noonday sun streams in through the window, illuminating the clouds of dust that fall through the air, and he contemplates them, stretching his legs out in front of him and staring at the dust rather than closing his eyes because whenever he closes his eyes all he can see is—

"May I join you?"

He looks at the doorway, and there she stands, a basket on one arm and the same smile—happy, yet tentative, he thinks, now that he sees her away from all her distractions—on her face. Seeing him glance at the basket she raises it and says, "I brought lunch."

"Then you are most welcome," he says, and he finally manages to smile back at her. She sits against the opposite wall, and divides the meal—cold chicken, apples, and a pint each of Sal's ale—between them. He tears off a strip of chicken with his teeth and chews on it; they have always treated these meals as battlefield ones, stripped of the pomp and circumstance of a courtly dinner, and he is relieved to see her do the same with her chicken, relieved to know that some things, at least, have not changed. How many, and what sorts, of things remains to be seen, but it is an encouraging beginning. He tries not to stare at her and ends up staring at his boots instead, between which he can see the deep blue of her gown and her tiny, silver-slippered feet, and he smiles in spite of himself—or perhaps simply because he wants to smile, and there is nothing to stop him from smiling. She sees the smile, and smiles back, and he realizes he is grinning stupidly at her but he cannot figure out how to control his own expression; he is a little giddy, such as he has not been in many, many years, and he is afraid his inexperience shows.

"So," she says, as she moves onto her apple, presumably inspecting it for brown spots rather than looking at his face.

"You're alive," he says, and as he says it the giddiness threatens to overcome him again, and he focuses his gaze on his boots.

"It's a bit of a surprise," she admits with a laugh, still running a finger over the skin of her apple. "There have been some pretty close calls. Too close for comfort. And you?"

He shrugs. "My city has been at peace."

"That's good."

"Thanks to you."

"I am quite sure you are over-exaggerating my role."

"No," he says, running a hand over the flagstone floor. "Your Keep has become quite a formidable force in your absence."

"I noticed," she says, and she finally takes a bite of her apple, standing as she does so. In another graceful movement she has settled in her chair, and the sight of her sinking into its plush cushions makes him smile again. She meets his eyes, the apple in her mouth, and when she has swallowed she says, in a far quieter voice, "And how have you been?"

"Well," he says, and he means it beyond its polite veneer. "Very, very well." Better, he wants to add, now that you're here, but isn't quite sure he has the right to do so. He remembers his mental verbosity upon her death and laughs at his inability to speak now that she is here, in front of him, real and warm and solid, tangible, yet somehow out of reach.

"I'm glad," she says, and casts her eyes to the apple, which she rolls in her hands. "I have…been better, but…I am well."

"Good," he says, and he does not know what else to say, and so he watches her take another bite of her apple, and then another, and as she takes the third, he musters up his courage (never lacking on the battlefield, yet somehow reduced to tattered shreds in her presence); as she swallows her fifth bite, he finally says, "What will you do now?"

"Now?" She looks surprised, as if she hasn't considered the question. "Well, I want to take Gann and Safiya to West Harbor—I think they'll like it there, it's swampy, kind of like Rashemen—"

"Rashemen?"

"Oh, yes. I have stories," she says, a gleam of amusement brightening her eyes, "but they will keep a little longer. So to West Harbor I go, and then after that…who knows? I suppose," she says, her eyes now darting to his, now darting away, "it depends in part on what your lord wants."

His mouth goes suddenly dry, and hope, as terrible as it has always been, rises in him again. "Will you go wandering, like you said?"

"_Wandering_?" She starts to laugh, and then suddenly stops and looks him directly in the eye. She tosses the apple core onto the chicken bones and says, "Nevalle, I have fought the most powerful being I ever expected to meet only to be flung halfway across Faerûn for all my efforts. I have traveled three planes of existence with a hagspawn and a _wizard_, dealt with lords of life and death alike—I could eat _souls_, for gods' sake. I have seen the heights of power and the depths of weakness, watched men whittle away their lives for no reason, nearly lost myself to the Powers That Be—"

He watches her face, sees the lines deepen, the eyes darken, the skin draw tight with tension, and he reaches out his hands, though she is too far away to be placated. She sees the gesture and breaks off abruptly, and says, "Nevalle, I have wandered further and farther than I ever think I wanted to go in the first place. I just—I just want to go _home_."

"And stay?"

She swallows, and he wonders what tone of voice he has, for he doesn't know—desperate, perhaps, or maybe just lonely—and she says, "Yes, I think so."

"I—" He stops, and simply holds out his hands, and waits.

She doesn't move. "I need time," she says, "time to adjust to being back here, time to look back at everything, time to—damn it, _stop_ that."

"Stop what?" he asks, and is surprised at how playful his own voice sounds.

"Looking at me like—like—" And then she is out of her chair and her hands are in his, and she curls up against him and buries her face in his chest, his chest which is too constricted to breathe, infinitely aware of her right there, where she ought to be, filling the void as he has thought it would never be filled again. Her voice, muffled into his chest, mumbles, "Like you don't care two years have passed, like you—"

"They did," he says, one hand freeing itself from hers in order to stroke her hair—soft, so soft—"But I waited for you, too."

Her sigh shudders her frame, and she whispers, "I missed you. I missed you and I never even thought—I _missed _you—" and that is all he needs to tip her chin up and kiss her, slowly, softly, as he has dreamed of kissing her, as he knew he could never kiss her again. Her hands ghost his face before tangling in his hair, pulling him closer; she trembles beneath his touch, as if she is terrified, while he cradles her face, her head, with infinite tenderness and patience. He is overwhelmed with sensation, lightheaded with joy and surprise all at once; but more than that, he is at _peace_, and it is this peace he gives to her, slowly, trying to communicate through touch what he has never been able to put into words, that even as she hurt him, she filled him more completely than anything he has ever encountered before, and he wants nothing more than to reciprocate this fullness, this being, this _peace_.

His lips move from hers to her cheek, then her temple, brushing against her skin and her mussed hair, and she buries her face in the crook of his neck and shoulder and he can feel the tears, wet on her face, against his skin, and he holds her while she cries. "I love you," he whispers in her ear, as he has wanted to whisper for so many months, and she raises her head, and regards him with eyes wide with curiosity.

"What?" he asks, and she cocks her head, resting it against his shoulder as she looks up at him, and says, "What?"

"I love you," he says, and she smiles slowly, like a candle wick catching flame, brightening her whole face.

"It's very kind of you to say that, Sir Nevalle."

"It's very true, Lady Tanithar."

She smiles again, lazily this time, one finger tracing his eyebrows, down his nose. "Would you like to know a secret?"

"I know many secrets."

"Mm, you might not know this one." She looks up and meets his gaze, and he smiles back, just as lazy. "I think you might like to, though."

"Try me."

"I love you."

"I guessed."

"You guessed." She taps him on the end of the nose. "But did you _know_?" Something about this amuses her beyond their surroundings, and she laughs.

"No," he says, smiling because she is smiling.

"Well," she says. "Now you know. You've managed to catch me, the most lascivious flirt to ever join the ranks of the Neverwinter nobility, and I've managed to catch the most Neverwinter-obsessed man to ever live in the city." She considers this, and places a finger over his lips when he opens them to protest this title—he can think of at least three living men who could vie for it—and finally says, "I think…I can live with that." She glances back at him and says, "Now, as to whether or not I can live with _you_…"

He blushes scarlet, for no reason other than the fact that these things take _time_—but they have time, now, all the time in the world to learn whatever else there is to know, and to learn it together.

"Tanithar?" he says, as her eyes take on that considering gleam he knows in so many facets, though he has never experienced it this closely.

"Yes?" she asks, already shifting to bring her head up and her lips close to his.

He brushes her hair away from her face, and runs a hand over her cheek, and then takes her hands in his, their fingers curling together as naturally as breathing, and says simply, "Welcome home."


End file.
